


Strike the Match

by doridoripawaa



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Big Bang Challenge, Edeleth, Elemental Magic, F/F, Royalty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:22:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 48,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27150025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doridoripawaa/pseuds/doridoripawaa
Summary: The Fire Empire is waiting with bated breath to see who their princess, Edelgard von Hresvelg, will choose as her suitor. As the most powerful fire elemental to ever grace the Empire, they have great expectations for her rule.However, after a mysterious mercenary arrives in the capital city of Enbarr, the Fire Princess has more important matters on her mind.(This was written for the 2020 Edeleth Big Bang! I am honored to have been a part of this project!)
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg/My Unit | Byleth
Comments: 39
Kudos: 203
Collections: Edeleth Big Bang 2020





	1. Prologue

_ “In time’s flow _

_ See the glow _

_ Of crystals standing high. _

_ On the swift _

_ River’s drift _

_ Broken kingdoms align.” _

The woman’s eyelashes fluttered as she gazed out the window at the moon, hanging suspended in its lofty perch in the night sky. Her hands rested on the windowsill, gently tracing patterns and circles into the weathered stones.

_ “Flames of old _

_ Shining gold _

_ The summer child’s domain. _

_ Waves will crest _

_ Dewdrops rest _

_ When winter’s child plays.” _

She turned around slowly, allowing her fingertips to glide against the rough surface of the castle wall before she broke away. Her attention shifted to four towering gems standing in the center of the room. Ruby. Sapphire. Emerald. Opal.

_ “Flower buds burst _

_ The soil thirsts _

_ When spring’s babe comes around. _

_ Gales whip by _

_ Clouds in the sky _

_ As autumn comes to town.” _

She walked forward carefully, deliberately, her heels clacking softly against the ground and her long gown shuffling as it dragged behind her. Every movement, every breath, every note, was cool, calm, and calculated. Finally she stopped in front of a pool of water that rested directly in the center of the four looming crystals.

_ “She stands tall _

_ Watches over all _

_ The Guardian of Light.” _

Her voice cracked. Scolding herself silently, the woman extended her hands out towards the pool. The water began to shimmer and shine underneath her outstretched fingertips.

_ “Guide us through _

_ These powers new _

_ And out of eternal night.” _

Her gaze drifted to a clear pane in the ceiling, directly above the pool. Starlight filtered into the room from this window, sending sparkles across the still surface of the water. Directly north was where the Blue Sea Star would shine, when the season came around again.

The final verse of the song escaped as merely spoken words, but the passion and reverence behind them was unmistakable.

“Blue Sea Star.

Whether near or far.

Your light will never fade.

The kingdoms persist

Per your final wish

For peace for all our days.”

She sighed and pulled her hands back away from the pool and in towards her chest. “What about my peace?” she murmured. “Oh Guardian of Light,” she breathed. “I can only hope that my performance meets your expectations. Please, continue to watch over this land.”

_ “For peace for all our days.” _


	2. Chapter 1: Embers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Edelgard prepares to meet with one of her suitors, and she is NOT looking forward to the occasion.

One stroke. Two. One stroke. Two.

Sunlight filtered in through the window, casting a faint glow upon porcelain skin and ashen hair.

_ “Flicker of fire, sliver of smoke,” _ a young woman hummed softly.  _ “Burn forever bright. Burn forever light.”  _ With each beat, she ran her brush through her thin white hair. The rhythmic, repetitive motions soothed her as she prepared for her day.

As she prepared for her very  _ long  _ day.

_ “From ashes, rise again. From cinders, become flame.  _ Ninety-nine. One hundred.” Gently she placed her hairbrush on top of her dresser, directly beside an ornate golden tiara, with horns on either side and a radiant ruby in the center.

A radiant ruby, perhaps, but not nearly as precious as the one hanging from her neck.

Carefully she began to twist and tug at her platinum hair until she had formed a large blond bun on the side of her head. Holding onto her (lopsided) hairstyle with one hand, she reached her free arm out towards one of the gold-plated horns. She scowled as she realized that she had placed it just out of reach. Slowly she slid over on her seat, trying to scoot to the edge of her bench. She stretched her fingers out as far as they could reach, and a wide grin spread across her lips as she grasped hold of the tip of the horn. “Aha!”

A sharp rap on the door cut off her celebration. “Lady Edelgard!”

Edelgard nearly jumped out of her seat, sending her carefully organized hair now falling in a cascade around her head and neck. She cursed under her breath as she held the horn up to her head, without any bun in which to place it.

“Lady Edelgard?” the voice called again, and an even fiercer knock resounded at her door.

  
“One moment!” she called back, eager to quiet the frantic guard. “I am finishing my preparations!”

“The son of Count Gloucester has arrived!” He definitely sounded like he was in a panic. “Ahead of schedule!”

Edelgard rolled her eyes as she wrapped her hair into a bun again and then hooked it around the golden horn hair ornament. “If he’s anything like Count Gloucester, I’d say we should just send him home now,” she muttered bitterly. Loud enough for the guard to hear, she replied, “I am almost finished, but I require silence!” With a huff, she placed her second horn ornament on the opposite side of her head, so that she now had a matching pair directly above her ears. “Now for the final touch,” she murmured, and she reached out to the golden tiara on her dresser. With a delicate touch, she lifted it up in front of her, taking a brief moment to admire the gem embedded in its center. “The original ruby,” she whispered. “Did your holder have to suffer the burdens of royalty, too?”

“Princess!”

“I hear you!” Edelgard snapped, finally at the end of her patience. “I am coming now!” She sighed and placed the tiara on her head, centered perfectly between the two horns. Her crown may have seemed over the top to some, but she felt that it perfectly represented the power of the Fire Empire. No,  _ her  _ power, as the Fire Princess and the most powerful fire wielder in generations.

At least, she was supposed to be the most powerful elemental to arise from the empire since its founding nearly 1000 years prior, so why did her father insist on trying to still find her a perfect husband to take place as emperor? Wasn’t her authority, her confidence, her independence, her wit, her raw power… wasn’t she enough? Her hand moved to the ruby hanging from a thick golden chain around her neck, and she clenched her fist around it. The warmth emanating from the small stone helped put her at ease and dissipate the doubt in her mind, like a torch in the middle of fog.

Edelgard rose from before her dresser and strode over to the door. She pried it open right on time, apparently, as she opened it to see the guard with his fist raised to knock a third time.

“Your Highness!” he gasped. “Thank you. We must make haste.”

“We will be going nowhere until I put my boots on,” Edelgard corrected him. Nobody was going to rush her. Her pace would be the pace that her people would follow, and quite frankly, her pace tended to be two to three steps ahead of the pack, anyway. “I woke up early for this reason. Please calm your nerves, friend.” She shuffled her foot a little after sliding her second boot onto her foot, and then she nodded resolutely. “Perfect fit. All right. Let us head off.”

The guard raised his arm in a salute and set off at a brisk pace. Despite Edelgard’s attempts to soothe his nerves and reassure him that the Count and his son would wait, he was talking at a mile a minute, trying to give her a rundown of the situation that awaited her in the throne room.

As if she hadn’t already studied to prepare for this day. Just because she didn’t want to meet any suitors did not mean that she wouldn’t prepare adequately for their arrival. ‘Know your enemies even better than you know your friends,’ she thought.

“Now, Lorenz Gloucester is a remnant of the Earth Nation, but his house has been loyal to the Empire for generations,” the guard rambled on and on as they walked. “So, while Caspar of House Bergliez is a fire user and thus better for the bloodline in that way, he is a second son, while Lorenz is the eldest.” Did this man not need to breathe? “Thus, the emperor still thought that he may be an acceptable suitor for you….”

“Acceptable,” a voice sneered from the shadows behind the thick red curtains of one of the hall windows. “I’d  _ accept  _ him as a sacrifice, perhaps.”

“Hubert!” Edelgard exclaimed, and upon seeing a familiar face, a rush of delight and relief flooded through her. It was a snarky, snide, and macabre face, but one that she trusted whole-heartedly.

The tall, lanky man stepped out from the darkness and strode up until he was nearly at Edelgard’s side. Out of respect, he stayed a step behind, and he matched his pace to hers to ensure that he would never overtake her.

“Walk beside me,” Edelgard urged.

“I promised to always watch your back, did I not?”

Edelgard sighed and kept pressing forward. She didn’t have time to argue with him. “Have you seen this Lorenz?” she inquired. “Is he at all impressive?”

Hubert chuckled softly, a sound like a crow's talons grating against metal. “Well,  _ he  _ certainly thinks he is, judging from the way he carries himself,” he commented, “but if he's the best that the Earth territories have to offer, then there will never again be an Earth Nation proper."

Edelgard cracked a smile at that bold--albeit snarky--proclamation. The Earth Nation had broken up before she was born, and not once in her life could she think of a time when her father had mentioned an actual Earth Nation, either. Unable to produce an heir or find a substitute, the land had fallen into ruin generations ago. The Fire Empire, being the ever so benevolent neighbors they were, had decided to take the Earth Nation underneath its domain, like a remora clinging onto a shark for scraps. 

At least they fared better than the Wind Country, which had also disappeared before her birth. Unfortunately, rogues and thieves seized upon its plateaus and steppes before anybody could extend a helping hand. The wind territory had completely faded, and as far as Edelgard knew, if any wind users did still exist, they kept to themselves, completely ashamed of the state of their country and in no position to bring it back.

Of course, the main condition for the Fire Empire’s protection was that the Earth citizens--commoners and nobility alike--swear fealty to the Fire Emperor. The Earth users were required to join the Emperor's army, but not even the most elite could join the prestigious Imperial Guard.

'It's foolish,' El thought bitterly as she continued her trudge towards the throne room. Her guard had only become more skittish and frenzied upon noticing that Hubert had joined them. His family had served the royal family since the Empire's founding, but Hubert himself was… a bit of an intimidating fellow, to say the least. One glance from his gold eagle-like eyes was enough to convince the guard to let him stay, though, and so he continued the trek alongside Edelgard, whose mind was swirling around in anticipation, in dread, and in ambition.

She didn't need a husband. And if she did, she didn't care about his status or what type of elemental he was or if he was one at all. "This system is a mess," she muttered. "The best people for the job are the best people for the job, period."

Hubert dipped his head slightly in acknowledgement. “Is that why you’ve kept me around for all of these years, Lady Edelgard? Or do you need me to prove my worth again?” His eyes glittered menacingly. “If your  _ suitor  _ is not to your liking, I could--”

“That won’t be necessary,” Edelgard interrupted. “Either for you or for me. I can handle myself, and I am always grateful to have you by my side.” She smiled softly at him, and unless her eyes were deceiving her, he seemed to smile back. “But I’m afraid this is where we part.”

A pair of giant golden gates waited before them: the doors to the throne room. Edelgard’s escort saluted the guards standing on either side of the room, and then he stepped to the side, gesturing for Edelgard to pass.

“I will see you later. I promise,” Edelgard told Hubert, and he nodded briskly before disappearing off into a corridor, melting like oil into the darkness. With a deep sigh, she straightened up and faced the double doors. The double-headed phoenix engraved into their surface served as a reminder of who she was. Who she was meant to be.

A blinding, brilliant light poured forth from the room as the guards pulled the doors open. Stained glass windows lined the walls, colored with mosaics in reds, oranges, yellows, and pinks. The sunlight that filtered through these windows resembled a live flame, roaring and licking at the center of the room as light and shadows shivered and danced.

“Presenting Her Imperial Highness, Princess Edelgard von Hresvelg!” the guard announced, and from all corners of the room, trumpets began to play. “A princess of the summer solstice, and the most powerful fire elemental to ever grace our halls! Her flames will illuminate the path to our future!”

Was that slimy-looking purple-haired man supposed to be her suitor? Edelgard swallowed the bile rising in her throat as she strode down the red carpet leading up to the throne. Her father watched over her like a hawk, scrutinizing her every moment.

_ “Embrace your flame,”  _ a song played in the depths of Edelgard’s mind. A lullaby.  _ “Have no shame.” _

She would definitely blaze a path to the future, even if that meant burning everyone else down around her to ashes in order to get there.

* * *

“Tell me about yourself, Princess.” Lorenz propped his chin up on his hands, gazing dreamily at his dinner companion. “What’s it like being a child of the solstice?”

Edelgard prodded her meat with her fork. Was this chicken? Turkey? “Even with a solstice birthday, I do not take my abilities for granted,” she replied coldly. “I still work as hard as everyone else.” The closer an elemental’s birthday was to their respective solstice or equinox--summer for fire, autumn for wind, winter for water, and spring for earth--the stronger they were supposed to be. Edelgard never asked to be born on June 22; the stars and her parents had just aligned that way.

“Surely you must derive some sort of advantage? Something nobody else can claim?” Lorenz pressed. “No need to be shy.” He put down his knife and reached his hand out towards one of her own. “We should get to know each other.”

A sharp, deep cough from the door cut him off. Hubert stood in the doorway, watching their every movement, and he apparently had not taken a liking to the Earth noble’s actions.

Lorenz immediately drew his hand back and ran it through his violet locks as nonchalantly as he could. “Erm, if you do not mind, of course. I do not wish to place any undue pressure on you, dearest Princess.”

An advantage that nobody else had. An experience that nobody else could claim. Edelgard shook her head rapidly, clearing her mind of the dark clouds that were beginning to creep in to cast shadows upon her mood. As if her mood could become any more foul. “I appreciate your… thoughtfulness,” she replied as she stabbed at a pea. “Please do not mind Hubert,” she added. “Where I go, he goes. I hope he doesn’t  _ bother  _ you.” The hint of a threat slipped from her lips, and Lorenz quickly drew his troubled gaze away from the brooding 6’2” shadow against the wall.

The young man at the table nodded fervently and then tapped his chin. “Ah, what do you enjoy doing in your spare time?” he offered, eager to change the topic. “I for one enjoy drinking tea, but I also happen to fancy--”

“Ambush!”

“I can’t say I’m fond of those, no,” Lorenz replied, not even looking up from the slice of poultry he was cutting up.

The door flew open, and Hubert barely stumbled out of the way before its thick wood smacked into his behind. “We sent... a patrol... to investigate... the black market for fire crystals... in the Badlands,” the guard wheezed. “But it… it was ambushed.”

Edelgard jumped to her feet at once, nearly sending her wine splattering all over the table. “How many soldiers were harmed?” she demanded. “Is anyone reporting to my father?”

“Y-yes, Your Highness,” he gasped. “My partner went to report to the king right away. We… we lost 70% of the patrol,” he added mournfully, his voice low and sorrowful. “But the remnants brought us quite the valuable gift.” His helmeted head perked up at the mention of this mysterious gift. “A prisoner.”

“A prisoner?” Edelgard echoed. She heard a scoff from behind her at the table, and she turned her head to see Lorenz shaking his head somberly.

“How barbaric,” he huffed, before stuffing his face with mashed potatoes.

Deciding that it would be in everyone’s best interest to ignore him, or perhaps to let Hubert deal with him after all, Edelgard refocused her attention on the soldier. “Why did you take a prisoner here?” she demanded. “Wouldn’t it be better to throw lowly thieves in a local jail?”

The soldier began to shrink under the force of her rapid questioning, but he tried to stand his ground. “This is the third attack in the past two weeks, Your Highness,” he tried to explain. “We think that maybe now we can gain some intel as to their motives, or at least try to determine if they have a ringleader.”

Edelgard folded her arms across her chest. “So you’re treating him like a war prisoner,” she murmured. “Just trying to get information by any means necessary.”

The soldier flinched, once again wilting beneath her intense words and intense eyes. “B-but that’s not all,” he stammered. “Your father thinks he recognizes this thief as a legend, someone from stories of yore.”

The princess raised an eyebrow and nodded, urging him to continue.

“We think he may be one of the Guardian of Light’s Crystal Knights. We think…” He swallowed hard. “We think he may be Jeralt. You may not recognize that name, but he has gained notoriety through his epithet.

“The Blade Breaker.”


	3. Chapter 2: Gusts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Byleth is determined to find where her father has gone... even if that means going all the way to the Imperial Capital of Enbarr.

Jeralt had been gone for a little too long.

A young woman sat on a large, flat rock, watching the adults around her mingle, laugh, drink, and be merry. Today’s venture was completely unexpected, but their relative success in the endeavor made it that much more worth celebrating.

Any noble, merchant, peddler, or even villager with a sensible head on their shoulders and some sort of value of their reputation would not dare to step foot into the abandoned terrain of the Desert Lands, but for social undesirables, for loners, for those without friend, family, or land to which to return… the deserted Desert Lands were a safe haven. For a band of mercenaries who valued treasure over title, the Desert Lands beckoned like a siren.

“Byleth! Don’t cha want some o’ this wine?” An older gentleman came staggering over to her, and the light of the campfire illuminated his toothy grin, gaps and all. “Jeralt certainly would want cha to cel-” He hiccuped. “-ebrate wit’ us!”

Byleth seemed undisturbed by his slurred speech or his overly enthusiastic demeanor. In fact, she hardly seemed disturbed about the mention of her father, whom she had not seen since the siege on the thieves this morning. “Where is he?” she thought aloud. “Jeralt.”

The mercenary scratched his stubbly chin thoughtfully. “Haven’t seen ‘im,” he concluded at last. “Pro’lly out for a walk, as he has a likin’ to do after a big bat-” Another hiccup. “-tle.”

Whether Byleth found this answer acceptable or absurd, her expression gave no indication. Instead she just nodded and murmured, “He does like to do that.” Her gaze traveled up to the stars twinkling above, completely ignoring the man’s offer of alcohol and instead allowing her thoughts to travel to the sky.

He shrugged and teetered away, muttering something under his breath about a “talented swordmaster” who also happened to be an “emotionless slate.”

Even if Byleth had heard the commentary, it probably would not have aroused a reaction from her. She knew the rumors that spread throughout the traveling packs of merchants and mercenaries alike, about an “Ashen Demon” whose face retained the same blank look whether she was celebrating a victory or mourning a loss. Whether she was congratulating a mother on the birth of a new life or slaying an enemy whose life would soon come to end at her hands.

With a sigh, Byleth turned her gaze back outward to the scrubby grasslands around them, in the general vicinity where she knew a slim river churned in the distance. “He didn’t even bring his fishing pole.”

_ Where  _ in Fodlan could her father have ventured?

“Didja hear?”

A group of inebriated mercenaries from her local band was heading in her direction. Byleth’s glassy azure eyes cast a quick glance at them, but then they soon refocused on the horizon.

“About the Imperial soldiers?” a woman replied. “They cleaned up all the ruckus leftover from that disgusting band of thieves, didn’t they?”

“That’s not all,” the first voice insisted as he plopped down onto a small boulder. He yelped slightly as his tailbone made contact with its hard surface; apparently he underestimated how much force was behind his fall, or maybe he didn’t expect the boulder to be quite so dense. “I hear they snapped up one or two of our own!”

“No way,” a young man, probably close to Byleth’s age, breathed. “Is that why I haven’t seen Clancy since noontime? He lent me a few of his arrows, too, the damned fool,” he hissed.

The first man’s voice became more and more hushed with every word he spoke. “Yes, but they may have snatched someone else in their grip too,” he went on, the strain in his voice becoming heavier than the boulder on which he sat. “And we all know how the Fire Empire treats its prisoners.”

“You don’t mean--”

“Our own Blade Breaker has been missing since the morning,” he murmured, and Byleth thought she heard a small sniffle.

That was the last thing that her ears could clearly discern, however, because a sudden rush of dread overpowered her mind. Her father? Taken by the Empire? She raised two shaky hands up to her head, pulling so tightly on her hair that she yanked out a couple of cerulean strands. “Jeralt,” she whispered.

At once, the din around her ceased. The other mercenaries must not have noticed she was there, but now that they had acknowledged her, regret and anxiety began to flicker in their eyes. “Hey, Byleth,” the woman managed to utter at last. “How ar-”

  
Byleth did not have time for pleasantries. “How do we get to the Fire Empire?” As far as she could remember, she had never been anywhere near the castle. She mainly remained in the Desert Lands, occasionally journeying to the edges of Water Kingdom territory or to a Fire--no, Earth, no, technically Fire-- village on the outskirts of the main land.

Protests. Denials. Reassurances. Condolences. Anything and everything that the mercenaries could hope to tell Byleth to change her mind and convince her that the time had passed and she was too late to act.

Byleth had no sense of danger, however. No sense of regret or woe. Just pumping adrenaline and a warm glow from the inside of her chest that beckoned her forward, pulled her to the Fire Empire, ushered her to save her father.

Without him, she would be truly and completely alone.

_ “Be brave, child,”  _ a voice seemed to whisper in the wind.  _ “Follow your heart, and your body will keep up with the rest.” _

* * *

Sneaking into the central city of the most powerful, influential territory on the continent was a little more difficult than Byleth had anticipated.

She wasn’t sure how she managed to blend into the back of an Earth village caravan, at a medium-sized build with her muscles and her teal blue hair, but the ample space in between the sheep had left room for her to snuggle in tight and even stay warm. The smell was an unfortunate price to pay for her free board, though.

They had been proceeding at a leisurely pace, and Byleth had almost fallen asleep after trying to count all of the sheep who were keeping her company. As she was drifting off after naming the fifteenth sheep “Cirrus,” the sharp screech of wheels skidding to a halt and the sudden lurching forward of the carriage abruptly woke her up from her stupor and snapped her back to her senses. Her back slammed hard against the wooden floor of the carriage and she raised her hands up to shield her face from frantic, stumbling hooves.

Cursing under her breath, Byleth straightened up and pushed her head up through a small gap between two of the fluffier sheep, Cumulus and Cotton. She tried to push her way forward until she could reach the canvas lining the edges of the caravan, and gingerly she peeled back at one of the corners until she could peek outside to see what exactly had caused their sudden stop.

Out of the corner of her limited window, Byleth could discern the rear end of a horse, the rear end of a driver, and… was that a wall?

Tall pillars of gold shot up into the sky, and they stretched horizontally to be so wide that they were larger than any building Byleth had ever seen. Two uniformed soldiers stood at the door, adorned in red suits with gold and black embellishments. They exchanged a few words with the merchant at the reins, and then they stepped back with a nod, signaling for her to move forward.

Forward where? Byleth lifted her chin and cast her gaze from side to side, trying to discern a door in the midst of all the carved details. She could see an eagle with its wings stretched wide, soaring above… a flame? Realization struck Byleth and she understood that bird to be not an eagle, but a phoenix. These Fire Empire folks weren’t exactly humble about sharing their powers with a great beast of old, were they?

The ground began to rumble and shake, and Byleth dug her nails into the wood, trying to steady herself. Did earthquakes happen in this part of the kingdom? Was an Earth elemental attacking the cargo? As the gates began to open, so did Byleth’s jaw. The Ashen Demon may not have looked too surprised to the average person, but for her, this simple expression of awe was more than she usually emoted in an entire year. She was so startled to learn that this wall was actually a pair of gates that she nearly gasped. Remembering her place, however, she ducked back down into the caravan and waited for her ride to begin once again.

If the mere gates to the Imperial Capital were this impressive, what would the rest of the city have in store for her?

* * *

“Three,” she whispered as she peeled back the canvas at the back of the caravan.

“Two,” she breathed as she lowered herself into a squat.

“One,” she murmured faintly as she raised her arms above her head.

  
“Now!”

With a quick little tuck and a roll, Byleth propelled herself out of the caravan and onto the dirt road, shielding her face as she flipped over in the dirt. Thankfully the caravan had not been too high above the ground, but jumping out of a moving vehicle was always a risky venture. Byleth had heard other mercenaries describe her as bold and brash, and candidly, she had to agree with both factions.

  
The young woman came to a halt on the ground, and she sprung to her feet as soon as she could see clearly again. Coated in mud, grime, wool, scrapes, and bruises, she probably looked like she had just wandered off of a sheep-infested battlefield, and she probably smelled like it too. Byleth had no time to waste fretting over her appearance, however. The sun was already beginning to set in the sky. Almost three entire days had passed since she had left the Desert Lands behind, and a dark pit of doubt began to gnaw at her from her core. Was this what the other mercenaries had meant when they said she was too late? She hadn’t taken a break from her travels even once, and she hadn’t exactly slept comfortably in the sheep caravan for the past day. Nevertheless, as she drew closer and closer to her goal, she felt a renewed sense of vigor that cast any exhaustion out of her limbs and any worries out of her mind.

“Dearie!” a voice cried out incredulously from one of the stalls on the road.

Byleth didn’t even realize the merchant was calling to her until she had stumbled forth to block the mercenary’s path. The merchant was a slightly older woman with frizzy, greying hair. “Have you had a decent meal in days?” the woman cried mournfully. “Or a bath?” she muttered, raising a hand up to her nose without attempting to be discreet. “Come, child, let me feed you some of our orchard’s freshest apples,” she went on, gesturing towards her stall. “Maybe a Noa fruit, if that’s more to your liking!”

Byleth began to rummage around in her pockets for any spare change she may have had remaining. Not realizing just how distant the capital was, she had spent most of the money she brought on her first day in the kingdom, splurging on meat and bread in an Earth village. “I…” Her fingers grazed against hard metal, and she let out a sigh of relief. “I like the taste of cherries,” she told the woman. “And fish. Always fish.”

A breeze fluttered past, carrying the scent of fruit towards her. But it also carried another scent, a fouler, more repugnant, and painfully familiar scent.

Rogues.

Byleth shoved the merchant to the side, ignoring the screech that the older woman emitted as she tumbled to the ground. A flash of black and brown cloth whipped past her, and the cold glint of steel caught the light of the setting sun. Byleth drew a small blade out of the holster on her hip and parried the attack. “Leave her be!” she snarled, digging her heels firmly into the soil beneath her boots. “Get out of the capital!”

“Aww, are you here to ruin our fun?” the rogue sneered as he came screeching to a halt before her. He tossed the sword into his opposite hand and then pulled a second blade out from his cloak. Byleth scowled as he lunged forward with it, and she tried to think quickly of the best way to retaliate. She couldn’t defend two attacks at once with her one blade, but she did still have the pads on her elbows and knees. With a grunt, she lifted her knee to deflect his smaller dagger, and he let out a harsh “tch!” as he sliced with his other hand.

Thankfully, he didn’t seem to be ambidextrous, as his movements with the bigger sword were clumsier and slower with this hand than they were with his initial attack. Byleth easily deflected the strike, and as he stabbed with the small blade again, she easily sidestepped it and then slammed her elbow down onto the crook of his outstretched arm. He let out a yelp as she smacked down with all of the force she could muster--which wasn’t much after three days of traveling, but it was sufficient--and the dagger dropped from his hands.

Byleth smirked as she saw the blade fall to the ground, and she immediately kicked it with her boot to knock it out of his range. She pulled her blade in close to her chest, preparing to counter his next strike, but the sneer on his lips and in his eyes suggested that he wasn’t the one she should be worried about.

The crisp, sharp sound of blades slicing through wind like butter resounded in the distance. Byleth didn’t have time to calculate how fast they were moving or how soon they would arrive.  _ “Listen to your heart,”  _ a faint, familiar voice breathed on the breeze.  _ “Where do you want the wind to go?” _

Ideally, away from her and into the first thief who was still pestering her. Once the flying knives came into view, Byleth didn’t think she’d have time to move out of the way, but she was at least going to try. The wind whipped around her forcefully, sending her navy locks flitting about her like a tornado, as she allowed herself to fall onto her knees and hopefully avoid the knives.

The knives, as forceful and deadly as they seemed as they came flying at her initially, did not come anywhere near Byleth now. The wind changed course and blew them onto a new path, careening directly towards the first rogue who had attacked the older merchant. 

A knife to the shoulder. A knife to the thigh. A knife to the abdomen.

Three strikes, and this rogue was out.

Byleth slowly rose to her feet as the thief came toppling down. She didn’t have time to worry about him, though; she needed to determine the source of the knives. Whoever this guy’s accomplice was, they had an incredible--and therefore deadly--range.

The mercenary never got the opportunity to search, however. An enormous uproar rose from the stalls and carts around her, and a scrawny man came scrambling up to her, shouting, “Miss! Miss!” He wheezed and panted and gasped as he fell onto his knees beside the fallen rogue, who was breathing heavily on the ground. “You saved me,” the man gasped as he pulled a coin purse away from the thief’s belt. “Without this week’s earnings, my family…” He began to sob, and he reached out towards Byleth with a sweaty palm and a snotty nose. “Thank you!”

“You saved me, too,” a woman’s voice called from behind stacks of melons and berries. The merchant from earlier stumbled out into the open, rubbing her hip. “I was offended at first, but now I know you were just trying to help. You were faster than lightning!”

Words of praise echoed and reverberated around the small shopping plaza, all singing praises to the mysterious woman with the blue hair and the ever-blank look upon her face.

“I… I’m happy to have helped,” she stammered. “But I-”

“We should take her to the castle!” someone chirped. “She would make an amazing soldier!”

“Is she an elemental?” someone else piped up. “Imagine someone like this on the Imperial Guard!”

“I didn’t see her use any fire,” another voice remarked. “Surely she would have burned this piece of trash to a crisp if she could have! Oh, we should probably get some medical help for him or turn him in to the soldiers.”

Words were flying faster than Byleth could hear and process them. Elemental? Fire? Imperial Guard? One word stood out above the rest, though: Castle. “The castle,” she repeated. “Take me to the castle.”

“With pleasure.” A young man with long, flowing ginger hair stepped out from among the masses, away from the foot of the carriage at which he had been resting, and the crowd immediately parted before him. He waltzed up to Byleth before bowing slightly, and soft gasps and murmurs began to resound throughout the crowd. Who was this man? “Although personally, I’d love to have you come back to my territory,” he admitted. “Ah, but a proper Prime Minister should try to support the imperial family, right?” He beamed at her and extended a hand. “I am Ferdinand von Aegir,” he introduced himself. “Son of Prime Minister Ludwig von Aegir, tea aficionado, and…” He raised his head and made direct eye contact with her. Sparks flashed in his eyes, burning with more intensity, power, and ambition than Byleth had ever seen in any human being before. “The third-most powerful fire elemental in the Empire, but who’s counting? I was en route to visit the princess myself, actually, to ask for her hand in marriage. Maybe bringing a strong soldier candidate with me will help curry favor. I would’ve stopped the attacks myself, but alas, you beat me to the punch.”

Princess? Marriage? Unimportant details.

“Ferdinand von Aegir,” Byleth repeated, and now she bowed before him. “Please take me to the castle. Take me…”

Should she reveal her motives for visiting the capital?

“Take me to the emperor’s soldiers, and let us take this prisoner along for the ride.”

As Byleth rode off with her new entourage, faint laughter tickled her eardrums like a warm summer gale.  _ “Perhaps I shall not take a nap just yet.” _


	4. Chapter 3: Kindling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Edelgard receives a guest, although not the one she was expecting.

Silver calligraphy. Sea-colored wax. Sepia tea stain.

“My dear stepbrother,” Edelgard murmured with a sigh, “you really ought to make sure you don’t seal your letters while drinking your chamomile.”

Knocks reverberated against her bedroom door, and the princess barely managed to suppress her frustrated groan. She shoved her brother’s letter into her pocket and rose to her feet so she could see which guard wanted to bother her for what reason and whether she wanted to deal with it.

Much to her surprise and confusion, upon opening the door she found herself face-to-face with a slim ribcage shrouded in black garments. The princess tilted her head back and cast her gaze upward until she made direct eye contact with her visitor. “I expected you to be a guard,” she commented. “What happened to our special knock?”

Hubert bowed deeply, looking somewhat ashamed. “My humblest apologies. I was in a rush,” he explained. “You see, we have a visitor at the castle.”

Edelgard raised an eyebrow, but she motioned for Hubert to follow her inside her room as she headed over to her closet to fetch her boots. Today was supposed to be her day off, given that her next suitor was scheduled to arrive tomorrow. She had grown up with Ferdinand von Aegir, a constant “rival” for her position and her prestige, but his father must have talked him into trying to compete for the crown in another manner: by joining the matchmaking melee.

“That tea-blooded fool has already arrived,” Hubert informed her as he stepped over a pile of armor at the foot of her bed. “And he brought a street rat with him.”

“ _Ferdinand_ is associating with a commoner?” Edelgard exclaimed incredulously, and she winced as she pulled the laces on her boots a little too tightly in her shock. She began to massage her shin and loosen up the laces as she asked, “What kind of stunt is he trying to pull?”

Hubert shrugged and bent over to tie Edelgard’s other boot. “From what I overheard, this nobody stopped an assault by a pair of thieves in the marketplace.” His slender fingers tied the laces delicately and meticulously, not wanting them to be the least bit uneven or disheveled. “The merchants were insisting that we take her as a member of the Imperial Guard.”

The platinum-haired princess snorted, and then she flushed deeply when Hubert cast her a surprised, teasing look.

“How princesslike of you,” he commented casually, then turned back to her shoe.

“Oh hush,” Edelgard muttered, and she stretched her arms above her head as Hubert finished lacing her up. “I just think that’s preposterous. Nobody recognizes her? Then she can’t be any reputable Fire elemental, or we would have heard of her.”

Hubert nodded in agreement, but the glint in his eye suggested that he had more he wanted to say. “Her hand-to-hand combat skills are of note,” he began, “but from what I heard, she also had a stroke of… luck, in her battle.” He extended his hand, which Edelgard graciously accepted as he led her to the door. He bowed slightly as she stepped in front of him, taking the lead into the hallway. “Passerbys said that knives managed to narrowly avoid her, instead turning sharply on a fortuitous breeze and striking her foe.”

“A breeze that strong managed to alter the knives’ path?” Edelgard repeated, and she narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “I would be very interested to meet this woman.”

“Then we shall go to the Great Hall, where His Majesty plans to receive Ferdinand and his entourage.”

Edelgard didn’t waste a moment’s time before setting off, her skirts and Hubert trailing behind her.

* * *

Dirt. Dust. Dandruff?

Edelgard couldn’t begin to name the substances clinging to this mysterious woman’s clothing or her hair. Her bizarrely blue hair. Her skin was caked with mud, her cloak was torn in a couple of places, and Edelgard could not wrap her mind around the thought of this woman fighting thieves in shorts that were so tight and barely covered her bottom.

“Maybe you could take a bath while you wait for the king,” Ferdinand suggested gently. “Then we can call him when you are cl- Ah!” His head perked up at once at the sight of the small white-haired woman and tall black-haired man heading in his direction. “Hubert! Lady Edelgard!” He bowed gratuitously. “You would not believe the scene that this delightful young lady caused in the marketplace on my way here! You see…”

He began to describe what he had witnessed, which provided no new intel to add to the clandestine operation Hubert had undergone to recover gossip around the castle. Thieves. Swords. Fruit. A fortuitous breeze. Even their guest didn’t seem to care to hear of her courageous exploits, instead allowing her gaze to wander around the tapestries, pillars, and people of the hall.

“Thank you for the information, Ferdinand,” Edelgard responded cordially but coldly. “I wish to hear from our hero herself, however.” She glanced up and down, trying to take in the young woman’s full appearance. She certainly had the look of a fighter, but more of a rogue or a mercenary than a pristine, polished soldier. “What village do you come from?” she inquired.

“I don’t.” The young woman blinked at Edelgard before continuing her perusal of the Great Hall. She must have found her surroundings more fascinating than the petite blonde in front of her.

‘Surely she knows who I am,’ Edelgard thought with a scowl. ‘She can’t be this oblivious… or this dumb.’ The princess cleared her throat and pressed further. “Where do you come from, then? Are you an immigrant from the Water Kingdom?”

She shook her head of messy cerulean locks. “Nope. The Desert Lands.” Her eyes were flitting about with more fervor and frenzy now. Edelgard assumed she must have been searching for something, judging from how frantically her stormy blue gaze was dancing around the hall. What could it be?

“I would implore you to be more polite to Her Imperial Highness, Edelgard von Hresvelg,” Hubert spoke finally, murmuring through gritted teeth. “She is gracing you personally with her presence.”

“Princess?” the young woman echoed. Now she locked her eyes directly onto Edelgard’s, and even though the rest of her face seemed to bear no emotion at all, a hurricane seemed to whip around inside her eyes. “Do you know where the prisoners are kept, Princess?”

A bold question. Who was this woman, and for what--or whom--was she searching? “I will not answer your questions until you answer mine,” she declared, and she straightened up until she was nearly eye-level with the mud-crusted mystery. “Who are you?” she demanded, her voice booming so loudly and passionately that it echoed throughout the hall. “Why are you here?” Even more importantly, how did she not know who Edelgard is? Tales of Edelgard’s prodigal nature tended to precede her. In a way, meeting someone who didn’t know her was concerning.

In another way, it was almost refreshing.

“Byleth,” she responded curtly. “I’m Byleth, and I-- Jeralt.”

Edelgard whipped her head around, following the intense gaze that sparkled to life as soon as one of the side doors creaked open. She spotted a pair of guards escorting a tawny-haired, muscular, scarred, middle-aged man along the side of the wall. Considering the fact that they had used one of the side doors, they had not wished to be noticed, but that plan fell to ashes as soon as Byleth caught wind of them. “Guards!” the princess barked. “What are you doing with the prisoner?”

“Jeralt!” Byleth cried out again. “You _were_ here.”

“That is our prisoner,” Edelgard informed her coolly. “You do not need to concern yourself with him.”

“That is my father,” Byleth retorted. “You do not need to punish him. We were stopping the thieves, not working alongside them,” she went on. “We’re mercenaries, not scavengers.”

Edelgard hardly focused on those words, though. Could that really be Jeralt, the legendary Blade Breaker? A former Crystal Knight? The man, the myth, the legend, who was thought to have passed away in the fire that ravaged the Crystal Citadel over twenty-five years ago? “If he’s alive, then…”

Then Lady Rhea needed to know immediately, so that the cold war between the Citadel and the Fire Empire could come to an end at last.

“Bring him to me,” Edelgard demanded, and the guards cast uncertain glances at each other. “Better yet, bring him to the baths. I think my father should meet both of these mercenaries.” She glanced over Byleth once more. “After they clean up, of course.”

Ferdinand shuffled his feet uncomfortably. “Your Highness, do you think it wise--”

The princess cut him off abruptly. “If I did not, I would not make such orders. I’ll call more guards to bring you to your quarters for the night,” she added, trying to assure him that she still planned to be hospitable despite the tumultuous turn of events. “In the meantime, I do believe Hubert and I will have a spot of coffee.”

* * *

_Therefore, my dearest stepsister, I do hope that you will take the utmost caution._

_I know you well enough to know that if I ask you to take a particular course of action, you will do exactly the opposite. But please try to refrain from investigating any peculiarities until I have the chance to arrive._

_Warm regards,_

_Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd, Crown Prince of the Water Kingdom_

“What could he possibly mean?” Edelgard mumbled to herself, scrutinizing the letter over and over again for any further hints. Had her brother encoded a secret message? Was he actually going to keep her in suspense like this? 

The princess paced the red carpet that ran along the Great Hall, every now and then casting an impatient glance towards the door that led to the guest tower. Jeralt, Byleth, and Ferdinand were supposed to have arrived as soon as the moon became visible in the sky, so why was she the only one around here who was actually punctual? “I can excuse the mercenaries, but a noble like Ferdinand…?” She shook her head in disgust. “He’s a wise, strong, capable man. I wish he weren’t such a fool.”

Not as foolish as the fleet-footed little shadow trying to creep along the wall, though.

“Byleth.”

Byleth stopped in her tracks at once, one foot still raised and her hands still pulled in tightly to her chest. She turned her head to look at the princess, but much to Edelgard’s surprise, the mercenary didn’t look the least bit embarrassed or ashamed. If anything, she just looked mildly surprised and minorly inconvenienced. “You spotted me.”

Edelgard fought the urge to roll her eyes. “You didn’t make it difficult. Where are you headed?” Now that Byleth had cleaned up, the princess had to admit that she was almost… attractive. Her former clothes were still being washed, but the simple red slip-on dress that she wore hung loosely from her waist but clung tightly to her other curves. Beneath the Fire Empire cloak that she wore, her biceps and triceps almost popped out of her skin. The thick scars that crisscrossed her flesh and the bruises that colored her kneecaps were a testament to her battle experience. So young, and yet, she seemed so wise.

“The kitchen.”

So wise, and yet, so foolish.

“I never had the chance to thank you for what you did in the marketplace today,” Edelgard began to walk towards her, her chin held high and her shoulders propped back in an attempt to look taller than she actually was. Byleth was probably about three inches taller, but her poor posture next to El’s prim and proper princess posture almost made them look equally sized.

Except for Byleth’s rippling muscles, of course.

Hoping that her face wasn’t as red as Byleth’s dress, Edelgard coughed slightly and then smiled as genuinely at the visitor as she could manage. “I would love to talk with you over some tea,” she went on. “Since you seem to be hungry.” She chuckled softly and twirled a loose white lock that had fallen from her buns. “What type of snacks should I request? Cakes? Cookies? Cheese? No, only my brother seems to enjoy cheese with his tea,” she added as an afterthought, looking somewhat ashamed on his behalf.

“Cookies would be great,” Byleth told her. “Um, thank you, Princess. For listening to me.”

Edelgard frowned and placed her hands on her hips. “My grace doesn’t matter unless my father extends his as well. Your father had better be who he says he is. Who you say he is.” She raised a finger to her throat. “Trust me when I say that the punishment we would give is far more lenient than whatever Lady Rhea would impose upon you. Be grateful.”

Byleth nodded. “I am grateful.”

So wise, and yet, so blunt.

“I would love to hear about where you and your father have been for the past twenty-five years. The legends say he and his newborn baby died in a fire.”

Byleth shook her head. “That’s wrong. I’m right here.” She paused and then held up her fingers, counting down on them one by one. “So I’m twenty-five, huh? How old are you?”

Edelgard had to concentrate to keep her jaw shut-- a considerable effort, given how completely and utterly shocked she was. “You didn’t know that? How much has Jeralt told you about his past?” Not wanting to be rude, she added quickly, “I am twenty-three.”

Byleth once again shook her head. “He didn’t talk about the past. He preferred to think about the future.” She glanced up at the ceiling and then frowned. “Except when we gazed at the stars, or picked flowers in a meadow. Then he would talk about my mother, but he didn’t really say much of substance.” Her eyes turned back to Edelgard; they were as placid as the blue sky on a hot summer day without a single breeze to provide relief. “Would you tell me about him?”

Edelgard would be lying if she said that the sudden, eager request from this otherwise stone-faced mercenary didn’t catch her off guard. “I will tell you what I know,” she conceded at last. Somehow, the earnest nature of this naive young woman enraptured her, trapped her within its embrace. She felt as though she were at the eye of a hurricane, seemingly safe and sound but just waiting for the winds to whip her and take her away.

She would burn it all down before they could even try.

“I do hope bergamot is to your liking.” Edelgard beckoned her forth with a single wave. “The others don’t seem keen on arriving in a timely fashion, so I dare say that they can wait for us to finish our own little meeting.”

Byleth raced up to walk alongside her, but she quickly adjusted her pace to match Edelgard’s own once she realized that her legs were a bit longer than the princess’s. Edelgard felt her face grow hot again, and she shifted her attention to the hallway in front of her as she walked towards the door to the kitchen. This complete stranger had no problem walking by her side? Hubert would have her head for that.

Concerning, but at the same time… refreshing.

She reached the kitchen way faster than she expected, a slight skip in her step as she breezed through the castle, feeling light on her feet and a tickle of the breeze in her hair.

* * *

“It’s about time you showed up!”

Shrugging his broad shoulders sheepishly, the young man dipped his head respectfully to the petite princess before him. “I took my fastest horse,” he began, “but not even I can control the weather.” He straightened up and ran his hand through his blond bangs, revealing a jagged scar atop a glassy eye, the only mark on his otherwise chiseled and handsome face. “It’s nice to see you too, El.”

Edelgard blushed and pouted as he used that familiar nickname. A relic of ages past. She casually raised her hand and pointed her index finger outward. A soft flame, like candlelight used to read a book at night, danced at the edge of her fingertip. “That’s Princess El to you, Dima.”

Not about to be intimidated, Dimitri raised his own pointer finger, upon which a bead of water rested like morning dew on a blade of grass. “And that’s Prince Dima to you,” he retorted with a small smile. “Listen, I would love to catch up, but I did not come here for idle chitchat. You see…”

Edelgard held up a hand to stop him. “My room. Clearly this is a matter of importance, or you would have simply written it in a letter.” She had practically had to beg him to stop sending so many letters. He would write to her to tell her about riding his horse on a sunny day, or to detail the souffle he enjoyed with his childhood friend Ingrid, or perhaps to tell her that he scored another sparring victory over his old pal and rival Felix, or even just to ask her if the weather in the Fire Empire was ever as cold as it became in the Water Kingdom.

The one time he had a reason to send a letter, he left out the important details and just strolled on up to the capitol instead.

“You’re incorrigible,” she muttered under her breath, hoping he wouldn’t overhear her. 

Unfortunately for her, the loss of his eye had made his hearing only sharper over the past five years. “You shouldn’t throw stones in a glass palace, Princess,” he responded with a smirk.

They spent so long bantering back and forth that Edelgard almost walked right past her own bedroom door. “Quickly,” she urged him as she propped the door open. “Before even Hubert can see.”

“Ah, Hubert. How is he?” Dimitri asked. He bowed slightly as he entered and began to take off his shoes. “Er, sorry. I should cut to the chase; I heard one of your suitors is here to visit.”

“Don’t remind me,” Edelgard groaned as she flopped face-first onto her bed. The thought of having another tedious day tomorrow, after all of the chaos of today, made her head begin to spin like a whirlwind. “He’s fine,” she added. “Seems to be enjoying this matchmaking process about as much as I am.”

Dimitri carefully seated himself on the edge of her bed. “I would imagine so. Dedue will probably feel the same way when my time comes,” he murmured sadly. “Anyway, the matter I was alluding to in my letter.”

The princess sat upright, now remembering why Dimitri had taken the journey all the way from his own castle to hers, which constituted a two-day trip if he was lucky and the weather was favorable. “Go on,” she prodded him gently.

Dimitri folded his hands together and began to twiddle his thumbs. “I am grateful every day that the Water Kingdom is still strong,” he began. “And that your Empire is healthy.” She bit her lip at the mention of “health,” considering her territory was anything but vivacious and lively, but she would keep that to herself. “The Earth elementals still manage to survive thanks to your… hospitality.” He was probably holding back some sort of stinging political commentary, but whatever had brought him here today must have been more important, so he pressed onward. “Alas, no wind elementals have been seen in decades. Maybe even centuries.”

Edelgard began to tap her foot impatiently against the wooden frame of her bed. “Why are you telling me what I already know?” she asked, a hint of irritation in her voice. “Do you think that I am not as well versed as you are in the politics and history of Fodlan?”

The prince raised his hands defensively, waving them in front of his face in a rapid denial motion. “No! I’m just… what I mean to say is…” He sighed and then leaned in close so that his breath was warm and wet against her ear. “There have been reports of someone in the Badlands. A strong individual who can defeat any foe, for a price. Someone who fights with the power of the wind at their side.”

Edelgard’s eyes grew wide and she leaned back so that she could stare him directly in the eyes. “You’re lying,” she breathed. “The wind elementals have been wiped out. The only people in the Badlands are rogues, thieves, black market peddlers, and…” Her breath caught in her throat. 

A fighter. A fee. A fortuitous breeze. 

A foreign visitor to the palace that day who brought more questions than answers.

A fire that now raged inside Edelgard’s core, and if Byleth wasn’t careful, a fire that she would allow to consume the entire continent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The beautiful art herein was made by Phatom12_art on twitter! I am so grateful to have had such an amazing partner for the Big Bang!


	5. Chapter 4: Droplets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dimitri and Edelgard consider the grim implications of Dimitri's latest discovery.

_ "You're lying," she breathed. "The wind elementals have been wiped out." _

How he wished he had been lying.

How he wished he had been joking.

How he wished he had never been more serious and honest in his life.

Dimitri furrowed his brow as he saw the expression that was spreading onto his stepsister's face. She appeared to be deep in thought--which was natural, given the storm that he just wrought upon her understanding of the world--but her flushed cheeks and twinkling eyes revealed another emotion, another feeling beginning to spark to life.

He expected confusion. He expected frustration.

He did not expect the raw anger that overtook Edelgard like a wildfire.

"Edelgard," he began, but as she turned those smoldering lilac embers onto him, he felt himself beginning to falter and fumble for words. That fire would burn indeterminately and insuppressibly if left unchecked, and if Dimitri wasn't careful, it could consume him, too. "Do you know what this means?"

Edelgard's thick, heavy voice weighed down on the room like thick smoke. "It means we've been lied to," she hissed. "For years. Wind users are among us."

Dimitri nodded slowly. "That could mean that other wind users are among us," he agreed. "Many hurricanes, sandstorms, and fire tornados that have been attributed to the other three kingdoms could have actually been the work of wind elementals," he postulated. The more he thought about the possibility of wind elementals roaming Fodlan, the more sensible it sounded.

And suddenly, his life began to make some sense, too.

"Edelgard."

He didn't realize how tense and cold he sounded compared to his usual voice, but apparently whatever tone he had used had startled Edelgard out of her trance, because she turned a very concerned gaze onto him. "Dimitri?" she prompted him gently. "Is something the matter?"

He folded his arms across his chest and sank into the mattress as he sank deep into his thoughts. "On that day," he murmured. "That day nine years ago."

Edelgard stiffened beside him. "The Tragedy of Duscur," she whispered. "What about it?"

The blond prince began tapping his foot against the ground. "They say that an icy gale knocked over my father's and stepmother's carriages that day. And, ironic as it may seem, I remember clearly the blizzard that overtook the scene, blinding us and leaving us vulnerable to attack. I remember… I remember being so cold. Freezing, even. My lips were allegedly as blue as my coat when they found me." He began tapping his other foot alongside the first, and the intensity of his tapping began to shake the bedframe. "Of course, everyone blamed the Duscur people. They are technically water elementals, which is why they live under the domain of the Water Kingdom, but their tribe specializes in the use of ice and snow." His words were flying faster and faster from his mouth, and he was practically vibrating from tapping his feet so rapidly. "Naturally, we all suspected that they were the ones who created a blizzard, by manipulating the snow. However, if wind elementals are out there…" The prince began rocking back and forth, no longer able to contain his energy that was beginning to overflow. His passion. His ire. "It could have been a coup d'etat. A coup staged by rogues from the Badlands who were desperate for money and power, or maybe exiles who wanted to watch the kingdom fall. I knew it couldn't have been the Duscur folk. Whatever tense aspects our relationship with them may have had, they were generally a peaceful folk, and we coexisted well. Dedue told me their gods value peace and prosperity. So why?" Dimitri whirled around to face Edelgard now, but he couldn't focus directly on her face. His eyes bounced around his head, looking at his sister and then the ceiling and then the bed and then the floor and then the stuffed bear on her pillow. He reached out to grab her shoulders, to steady himself. "Why would the ice elementals of Duscur attack the royal family?" He clenched down tightly, shaking madly, hoping for some sort of stability to keep him grounded. He felt like a river swelling in a storm, its waters overflowing and pouring out over the banks. 

"I don't know," Edelgard replied as calmly as she could. She reached up and placed her small, pale hands on top of his. "You need to breathe, Dimitri."

Breathe? Breathe? He would hyperventilate and probably choke on his own saliva if he tried. "They wouldn't, El!" he cried. "That's the point! They would never!"

"Breathe, Dima!" she snapped, putting much more force behind her words this time. "That's not a request as your stepsister. That's an  _ order _ as Fire Princess." She began to dig her nails into the backs of his hands. 

The sudden pierce of nails into flesh and the beads of blood welling on his hands didn't manage to catch his attention. The ferocity burning in his sister's eyes, however, caught him in their snare and helped bring his tide back within its banks.

"S-sorry," he stammered. "I just… I feel as though the truth is finally in my grasp. Oh!" More importantly, Edelgard's slender shoulders were still within his grasp. He immediately let go, which prompted her to remove her nails from his skin. "Ouch," he whimpered as he pulled his hands back to his chest. He began to wring them awkwardly, assessing the damage.

"Sorry. You were spiraling out of control." Edelgard was rubbing her shoulders, stretching and flexing and maneuvering in all sorts of directions as she tried to regain circulation.

Dimitri shook his head and then turned to face the wall, hoping to hide the red blush rising to his cheeks. "My apologies. I should have considered your feelings."

Edelgard smiled softly at him. She reached out to brush some of his long blond bangs behind his ear. "And I should've considered yours. I think we both lost ourselves for a moment there." She sighed and rose to her feet, dusting off her crimson gown as she did so. "What will you do now?" she asked.

Dimitri pondered the question for a moment as he hauled himself up to his own feet, tugging at the ends of his sleeves which were now wrinkled and ruffled. "I want to investigate Duscur." A blunt, straightforward answer, but the only one that made sense. The tragedy had plagued him for the past nine years of his life, and he had been searching for clues ever since then, only to hit dead ends. "I want to find the truth. For my father. For my--our--mother." He blinked warmly at her. "For Glenn. For Dedue. For everyone who deserves justice."

Edelgard wrinkled her nose at him. "What about for  _ you _ ?"

For him? Did he deserve to act for himself? No, he could not rest until their voices were silenced and their wishes appeased. How could he ever act selfishly, for his own benefit, when he didn't deserve to be alive at all? "What about you?" he asked, eager to change the subject. "What will you do with this information?"

Edelgard began to twirl some loose white strands of hair back into her buns. "I also have a matter to investigate." Cryptic as always.

"Perhaps we can exchange mutually beneficial information?" he suggested.

"Perhaps."

Edelgard had made it clear that that was all he would be able to pry from her. 'No matter,' he thought as she began to lead him out of her room, now talking about some tactical manual she had found hidden in the Imperial library. 'This is my burden, my sin, to bear alone.'

* * *

_ Trembling hands gently cupped around slender fingers. He tried to steady himself, but he never expected giving a gift to be so… nerve-wracking. _

_ “A dagger?” Edelgard wrinkled her nose as she scrutinized the object that he had placed into her hands. His fingers tried to curl hers to grip onto its gold-embellished hilt. _

_ “You’re so strong and brave, El,” he whispered, blinking warmly at the petite brunette in front of him. Small in stature, but so large in presence. “You need this more than I do.” _

_ Edelgard frowned at him and tried to drop the dagger back into his hands. “You’re a prince, Dimitri,” she murmured coolly. “You need it too.” _

_ Dimitri shook his head vigorously, and his blond bob bounced at the enthusiastic movement. “I’m going to be a king one day,” he agreed, “but you’re going to be Empress of the largest territory in the whole continent!” _

_ A small smirk crept onto her lips. “Maybe if you’re braver than your father, you could grab hold of the Badlands, and then we’d be equal.” _

_ Dimitri snorted. “Who would want the Badlands?” he scoffed, and his eyes twinkled with amusement as the pair of them chuckled together. “I mean it though, El. You didn’t choose to hide here in my kingdom, but I am grateful. Grateful we got to know each other.” _

_ Edelgard, for once, looked somewhat flustered. She shuffled her feet and looked as though she were racking her brain for a witty response, but she just humbly replied, “Me too.” _

_ It was so out of character for her that Dimitri was almost concerned. _

_ “From now on, carve your own path, El. Light up the world with your fire.” He pushed the dagger’s hilt firmly into her palm and closed her fingers around it. _

_ “Only if you promise to cleanse the world with your waves,” El retorted. “You’re going to be a kind king, Dima.” _

_ Dimitri self-consciously touched the sapphire that clung to the leather band on his wrist. “With the two of us ruling Fodlan, the future looks bright.” _

_ Edelgard, in turn, took her free hand to tap the ruby hanging from the chain around her neck. “It’s time for me to go,” she whispered. She moved her hand out to hold it before Dimitri, and she lifted a pinky. A soft blue flame danced on the edge of her fingertip. “Promise me you’ll be strong, too.” _

_ Dimitri’s eyes lit up and he held out a pinky as well, and a bubble welled at the top of his finger. “I will never let you down, El!” _

Why didn’t she promise the same?

* * *

The return ride to Fhirdiad was fairly uneventful. For once, no rain or snow fell from the sky as Dimitri rode along on his steed, galloping across hills and valleys. The mountains behind Fhirdiad grew ever closer, much to the prince’s relief; he was beginning to tire.

A guard called out to him from a neighboring horse, and Dimitri gently tugged on his reins to slow his horse down. The guard cried out again, more urgently this time.

“Stop! Stop!”

Stop? Dimitri yanked on his reins and his steed whinied sharply, seeming rather annoyed by the drastic change in pace. “Sorry, friend,” he whispered, stroking his horse’s mane as he waited for the guard to catch up to him.

“Your Highness!” the man gasped, screeching to a halt beside him. His horse nearly flung him from her back, but thankfully the guard was holding on tightly. “W-we have a visitor inside kingdom territory!”

“A visitor?” Dimitri echoed. He frowned and scratched his chin thoughtfully. Had he invited any visitors to the kingdom and simply forgotten? Had Gilbert perhaps made arrangements and neglected to inform him? Neither of those explanations seemed likely, so any “visitor” to the kingdom would thus technically be an intruder. Why did the guard describe this mysterious interloper as a “visitor” then?

“Prince Dimitri of the Water Kingdom.”

Rhythmic like the lull of the seas, airy like a gentle breeze, warm like a lit hearth, and firm like packed earth. This voice was all too familiar, and Dimitri immediately dipped his head in reverence merely upon hearing it.

“Lady Rhea.”

Two Crystal Knights pulled up on their own steeds, toting a white carriage in their wake. The doors were plated with gold, and a single ruby, sapphire, emerald, and opal adorned each of the four corners of the doorframe. However, Lady Rhea herself was not inside the carriage, but rather she was leading the pack, riding a noble white horse that trotted a few feet ahead of her knights.

At once, Dimitri moved to disembark from his own horse, but the Guardian of Light raised a soft, but sturdy, hand to halt him in his tracks. “We can speak from here,” she reassured him. Instead of her usual elegant white gown, she wore a white riding suit with golden embellishments. Golden shoulderplates and kneepads protected her most vulnerable spots, but she still looked majestic and confident as she sat on horseback. Her usual golden crown still rested atop her minty green locks, which were pulled back in a ponytail. Even when she was out in the fields instead of inside the tower with the crystals or addressing an audience, she still maintained a regal aura, commanding respect. “Oh, how you have grown since I last saw you.” She smiled again, but it was bittersweet. “Oh, how you have been forced to grow since I last saw you.”

Dimitri tried to hide his grimace, but he was fairly certain that the Guardian had at least noticed his flinch, because she pulled her horse up closer to his and reached out to gently stroke his cheek. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I understand that pain. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

“Please, do not apologize to me, Your Grace,” he murmured, and although he made eye contact out of respect, his gaze and attention were elsewhere. He hadn’t seen the Guardian in person since his parents’ funeral, following the Tragedy of Duscur. He hadn’t seen her since she gave her rousing speech mourning the senselessness of the tragedy and vowing to guide their spirits to the stars, alongside the Blue Sea Star where the Progenitor Guardian could care for them. At the time, the idea of the Progenitor taking his friends and family into her embrace had been comforting, reassuring, consoling.

Now, he wondered if the goddess had even extended her hands to them, and if she had, whether they were warm and welcoming or cold and callous.

Rhea withdrew her hand solemnly. She seemed to be deep in thought as she tucked some light green locks behind her ear, as if trying to choose her next words carefully. “You’ve done a fine job with the kingdom,” she began, but then her voice trailed off, as if that wasn’t the path she wished to follow. “I have some information that I think you may find useful, Dimitri.”

Cutting straight to the chase. Dimitri raised an eyebrow and trotted forward a little until he was practically face to face with the Guardian of Light. “You came here to assist me?” he queried. “I cannot begin to thank you for your generosity--”

Again she cut him off with a single raise of her hand. “Do not thank me too much,” she stated, and her voice almost carried the hint of a warning. A storm seemed to be brewing behind her glassy green gaze. “I also came to you seeking aid.”

The prince furrowed his brow and crossed his arms over his chest. “An exchange is what you seek,” he guessed, and Lady Rhea’s nod confirmed his suspicions. “Very well. Please, tell me everything you know.” If she knew anything about the Tragedy, especially in light of his recent discoveries about the rogue wind elemental, then he would be willing to give anything to learn it and piece this mystery together.

Anything and everything.

“Tell me, and I will see what I can do for you.”

* * *

That night, Dimitri took a little more time than usual to draw the water for his bath.


	6. Chapter 5: Sparks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Fire Princess makes an unpopular decision.
> 
> Who has the right to question it, though?

No matter the cost, Edelgard could not let that woman leave her palace.

As soon as the first rays of dawn began to filter in through the window above her bed, Edelgard flung off her blankets and sprung to her feet. Candidly, she had not managed to sleep much at all the previous night, as her mind swam with Dimitri’s new information and her own hypotheses. Of course, her stepbrother’s near-delusional conspiracy theories had popped up into her mind every now and then, but she did not have time to deal with his tirades right now. Once she sorted out her own issues, then she could manage to help him.

For now, she had her own path to walk, and she felt certain that he would want her to carve her way forward.

“I can’t imagine they’ll be staying here much longer,” Edelgard murmured as she slid into her small cushioned chair before her dresser. She picked up her hair brush and began to gently run it through her matted white locks, allowing herself to be soothed by the rhythmic motion of her arms and the tingling sensation of little tugs and pulls at her hair and scalp. “Ten, eleven, twelve,” she whispered as she dragged her brush along.

If Byleth Eisner knew anything about her heritage, then she was very effective at concealing her knowledge. She hadn’t revealed a single clue or stumbled even once during her brief tea time respite with the Fire Princess. In fact, she hadn’t said much of substance at all; she seemed to enjoy the eating and drinking more than the chatting. Edelgard furrowed her brow as she tried to recall some of the topics they had discussed. Fishing? Cats? The view from the castle bridge?

What number stroke was she on now?

Edelgard’s hands came to a halt as she realized she had lost track of how many times she had brushed her hair. One hundred strokes was the perfect number, derived from days, weeks of trial and error. “Byleth Eisner,” Edelgard hissed under her breath. “Why do you haunt my thoughts so? To even distract me from my daily rituals!” She huffed and brushed ten more times, hoping she was at least in the general vicinity of one hundred strokes.

She needed to pry some information from Byleth. Was a castle hiding in the dunes of the Badlands? Could other mercenaries manipulate the wind as well? Was an entire country hiding directly beneath her nose, simply stewing and gathering power before waiting to strike? The Badlands were on the exact opposite end of the kingdom as the Imperial capital of Enbarr, so she could not easily assign scouts to supervise the land. She generally relied on the Earth villages to the east and the Water Kingdom to the north to defend her southwestern territory from the northeastern deserts and plateaus. “Dimitri would certainly tell me if he noticed any peculiar movements in those horrid plains,” she mumbled as she placed her brush back down on the top of her wooden dresser.

The staff had treated Byleth and Jeralt to a grand feast last night, both to extend gratitude to the former and to offer an apology to the latter. Her father had even attended, albeit briefly. Now that their business was done and Jeralt was a free man, would the mercenary pair be returning to their people? If so, when?

“Mercenaries seem to work at odd hours,” she mused as she grabbed one of the horns of her golden tiara. “The trip to the Badlands takes several days. If I were them, I would…”

A harsh clatter echoed throughout her room as metal struck tile. Edelgard’s hands dropped to her sides and her horn went crashing to the ground as soon as she came to her conclusion: If she were a mercenary, she would leave at the edge of dawn.

“I don’t have time for this!” she hissed softly, and she bent over to sweep the horn up off of the ground and place it back on its rest on her dresser. “I’ll need to do something quick…” Hastily she pulled her long white hair to the left of her head in a side ponytail. "There!" She wrapped a ribbon around her hair to tie it in place, and then she scrambled to her feet. "Oh curses, I'm still in my pajamas!" She had been so swept up in her thoughts that she hadn't even bothered to put on daytime attire. "Let me rush to my wardrobe really quickly…."

Finally she emerged from her bedroom, donning a simple white button-up blouse with ruffled sleeves and collar, and a chestnut-brown skirt that went to her knees. Simple but professional. At once she took off down the hallway at a brisk walk, but as the sun continued to travel upward and across the sky, she felt her pace growing faster and faster until she was practically running through the palace like a flame through underbrush.

"Lady Edelgard!" a voice wheezed from behind her.

Edelgard slowed her pace to a jog, and she turned around to see Hubert stumbling down the hall in hot pursuit. She kept moving, but upon seeing him she slowed down even more until she was walking again, both to give Hubert a chance to catch up and to keep herself safe as she moved backwards. "Hubert! Good morning!" she called back.

Hubert inhaled sharply and sprinted forward, stretching his long, lanky legs as far as he could to try to distance the gap between them. When he was finally within speaking--rather than shouting--distance, he allowed himself to slow to tense jog. "You… are certainly up early," he gasped. "When I went… to your room, you had… already departed." He doubled over for a second, trying to reclaim his breath.

Guiltily, Edelgard slowed down to a snail's pace as she waited for Hubert to recollect his composure. Slow, but never stopping. Alas, Hubert had never been one for physical activity. "I had business to which to attend," she explained simply.

"Business so urgent that you needed to run?" Hubert seemed to regret the question as soon as the words left his lips, for he bowed deeply and murmured, "I trust your judgment, Princess."

Heat rose to Edelgard's face and she waved her hand dismissively. "You have every right to inquire," she assured him. "Yes, I am pressed for time. I am sorry if I caused you to worry."

Hubert picked himself up and began to jog forward again. Finally he reached Edelgard's side, and he smiled as she picked up her pace once again. "It is my honor to walk by your side, to watch your back, and to guard your front," he told her. "Wherever you want me, I shall oblige." His tone softened unexpectedly. "All you needed to do was tell me of this matter, and I would have showed up at your doorstep while the stars were still in the sky, to help you prepare."

Edelgard smiled tenderly and reached out to squeeze Hubert's hand. "I know you would," she murmured, "and I'm grateful. I'm sorry for not alerting you sooner, but this matter was… an unexpected one, one that popped up without warning."

Hubert raised an eyebrow. "One concerning our  _ guest _ , perhaps?"

Edelgard was positive that her face was a scorching scarlet now. She turned to the side and mumbled something under her breath that could either be interpreted as affirmation or denial. They were nearing the Great Hall now, but Byleth and Jeralt were boarded in a tower on the far side of the palace. She couldn't afford to get distracted.

"Speak of the devil," Hubert breathed suddenly, and Edelgard whipped her head around to face forward again. Her gaze came to rest upon a messy mop of blue-hued hair-- that of someone who was both a stranger yet also as familiar as an old friend.

Whatever words the guards and the mercenaries were exchanging could not have been particularly important, because as soon as Edelgard stalked forward, her chin held high, they immediately fell silent. "Jeralt Eisner, The Blade Breaker," she began, and he nodded at her. "Byleth Eisner," she went on, and she narrowed her eyes at the young woman. "Last night I believe you said you were called The Ashen Demon."

Byleth nodded. "That's right."

Flat tone. Dull eyes. Disheveled hair. 

And pale, ghastly skin that glistened like moonlight bouncing off of crystals.

"Thank you for the feast last night," Jeralt told her. "The Emperor was very kind to us and we appreciate his well wishes for our departure."

Her father had already tried to chase them off? The senile fool. 

"We once again apologize for our earlier misunderstanding, Jeralt." Edelgard blushed, still mortified at the thought of her father mistreating this innocent man. The thought of owing anyone a debt was not one that she could easily tolerate. "And Byleth," she went on, once again focusing intently on the woman's face. Her blank expression. "Are you sure you do not wish to become part of the Imperial Guard?"

Byleth shook her head. "I like the way I live," she stated simply. "I am, er, humbled by the offer though," she added quickly. Edelgard didn't have to be a mercenary to catch wind of the sudden jab in the arm that Byleth's father had given her.

"That's a pity," Edelgard sighed, and she ran her hand through her long platinum hair. "I was hoping to make an offer you couldn't refuse. You see, we did find it within our hearts not to tell Lady Rhea of Jeralt's reappearance," she murmured slyly, and she fought herself so that the corners of her mouth would not twitch upward upon seeing Jeralt's reaction to the name "Lady Rhea." Edelgard couldn't be certain, but she was willing to bet her own ruby necklace that the mercenary had very compelling reasons for hiding from the Guardian of Light for over twenty years. 

And that he planned to stay away for as long as he could.

"Then we're even," Byleth responded calmly. "After what you did to him."

A stab to the gut. Edelgard bit her lip to keep herself steeled. A sudden, sturdy hand on her shoulder reassured her. Told her wordlessly that everything would be all right. That she could easily stand her ground. 

"Then I cannot use a quid pro quo exchange to recruit you as my own personal mentor," Edelgard mused, and she emitted a drawn-out, breathy sigh. A soft chuckle sounded behind her.

"But I suppose I can use my royal authority."

The grip on her shoulder stiffened.

Edelgard managed to pry herself free, and she stepped forward until she was only an arm's length away from the mercenary woman. "I, Imperial Princess Edelgard von Hresvelg, hereby command you," she began, and sparks began to flicker from her fingertips. She raised her arm directly up to the sky, and an axe entirely composed of flame, from hilt to tip, materialized above her. 

At once, Hubert and the guards dropped to one knee and lowered their heads. Whenever the Fire Princess summoned her royal weapon, her elemental gift, they knew she was about to make a dramatic declaration: knighting, dueling, challenging, ordering, sentencing, imprisoning, rewarding. The emperors of the past had used their elemental gifts for all of these purposes.

Edelgard, however, had always been a trailblazer, and she was about to use Aymr for something that no emperor before her had done.

“Byleth Eisner, you will be my mentor.” She narrowed her eyes as Byleth stood before her, eyes wide as she gawked at Aymr in the princess’s grip. Fine. Edelgard would make do. She lowered the axe until it rested just above Byleth’s left shoulder, and the searing heat nearly singed the tips of Byleth’s blue hair and set her face glowing red. “You will teach me in the art of combat, so that I may blaze a new trail for the Empire when my time comes.” The mercenary had grown rigid as a board, but she had not protested, and so Edelgard continued. “You will be the oxygen to my flames. You will fan my fire.” She lowered the axe so that it hovered above Byleth’s right shoulder. “You will be the wind beneath my wings. By the time we are done, I will no longer be just a Fire Princess, but a Flame Emperor.”

Finally she stepped back and sent Aymr up towards the ceiling, where it hung in the center of the room like a lit chandelier. After allowing it to shimmer and shine and gather all eyes from the room, Edelgard clapped her hands, and it shattered into sparks, disappearing as suddenly as it had been summoned.

“My teacher,” Edelgard murmured, as she turned her attention back to Byleth. She extended her hand, reaching out for the blank-eyed mercenary like a lifeline.

“Hey, kiddo,” Jeralt muttered beside her. “This whole ordeal is suspicious. You don’t owe her anything,” he added. Hubert tensed behind Edelgard; clearly he could hear the mercenary’s muffled tones as well. No matter.

“The choice is yours, Byleth Eisner,” Edelgard went on. “But I dare say this is an offer you can’t refuse.” She reached further out, extending her fingers as far as they could go. “Reach for my hand, and I--no, we--will soar away.”

For the first time since the young woman had arrived, Edelgard thought she saw something behind her empty gaze. A twinkle, like a blue star.

“Very well. It sounds interesting.” Byleth extended her hand and intertwined her fingers with Edelgard’s. Was the room still hot from the power of Aymr? Why else would Edelgard’s face be growing so warm? “I like your tea, Your Highness. I suppose I can be the wind beneath your wings.”

A pact made at the edge of dawn.


	7. Chapter 6: Candlelight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Knowledge is power.

Slowly but surely, Byleth seemed to be warming up to her life at the castle.

Their training sessions had started out as terse and tense, but now they easily spent hours together, using weapons and magic alike. When they first started out, Byleth had completely been unaware of her elemental capabilities. Once Edelgard had awoken her to her inner wind prowess, however, she had learned… surprisingly quickly.

Almost frustratingly so.

“Your spirit is admirable!” Edelgard gasped as she side-stepped a cutting gale. Her hair tumbled down her back as it fell out of its blonde bun; the princess had learned that she needed to restrain her hair and wear skin-tight clothes when fighting Byleth, or else her teacher’s gusts would send her loose strands and attire flying everywhere to impair her vision. “However…” She rolled up the long red sleeves on her shirt and dug the heel of her boot into the packed earth. “I will prevail!” Edelgard inhaled deeply and crouched down, then smacked her palms against the earth to ground herself as she exhaled a thin, searing blaze.

Byleth’s eyes grew wide and she hopped to the side, easily dodging the small (albeit speedy) flamethrower. “You just… breathed fire,” she gasped. “Amazing.”

Edelgard scowled and leaped to her feet. “No time to be impressed,” she chided as she pulled her hair back into a low, sloppy ponytail. “We’re in the middle of--”

A billow knocked her off her feet and took the wind right out of her. Edelgard crashed onto her back, raising her arms to shield her face.

“Never let your guard down.” The ground trembled around her as heavy bootsteps strode up beside her. Edelgard raised a hand to her chest and ribs, trying to feel for any substantial damage. She was about to rise to her feet when suddenly a heavy boot stomped down directly beside her elbow, and then another foot stepped down beside her opposite elbow. Byleth Eisner lowered herself into a crouch, right above Edelgard’s abdomen, and looked the princess up and down.

‘Stop scrutinizing me like that!’ Edelgard thought, her face growing as red as her shirt. ‘I know I messed up!’ She swallowed hard and glared directly back into Byleth’s eyes, meeting her gaze despite her disadvantaged position. “Lesson learned, my teacher.”

Her teacher. For the first few magic lessons, Edelgard had felt more like the professor than the student. She had taught Byleth how to feel the magic flowing in her veins, how to visualize the elements, how to conserve her energy and move efficiently, how to make the most of her terrain. The only anomaly that Edelgard had not been able to address, though….

Byleth’s gaze drifted from the princess’s face down to her throat. Carefully she reached into a sheath strapped to her hip, and slowly she withdrew a dagger.

Edelgard scrambled to get up, but Byleth lowered her knee onto Edelgard’s stomach, effectively pinning her to the ground. “This would be bad if I were your enemy,” Byleth commented casually. She lowered her face until her nose was nearly brushing Edelgard’s. Every long, thick, dark eyelash stood out on her face, bewitchingly beautiful and deceptively deadly. Byleth gently lifted her dagger and pointed the tip at Edelgard’s chin. “But I’m not your e--” Byleth’s eyelids fluttered wide open and she suddenly pulled her arm back to sheath her dagger once more.

A petite, pale hand had twisted and grabbed tightly onto Byleth’s left leg, on the former mercenary’s exposed skin between the top of her boot and her leather kneepad. A searing, scalding hand.

Byleth twisted her leg to kick Edelgard’s hand off, but in order to do so, she had to give up her position atop of her. The princess took advantage of Byleth’s disoriented and unbalanced state, and she used her free arm to swipe under Byleth’s leg and knock her down. With a mighty huff, she thrust her hips and legs upward and out from under the mercenary. Once she had rolled a safe distance away, she scrambled to her feet and pulled a pair of flaming hot fists in towards her chest.

“That was sneaky,” Byleth gruffed as she hauled herself off the dusty ground and onto her feet, heavily leaning on one leg. “Excellent work. You made good use of that pelvic thrust, too.”

Edelgard tucked some loose hair behind her ears. “P-please do not call it that,” she pleaded, and then she shook her embarrassment off so she could face her instructor squarely. “I hope my heat was not too intense. I just wanted you to let go.” She looked over at the crimson kiss that had blazed across Byleth’s calf.

“You succeeded,” Byleth informed her simply. She moved as if to shift weight back onto that leg, but she winced and immediately leaned back onto her good leg again.

At once Edelgard hurried over and knelt onto the ground beside her. “Let me see,” she insisted. “Experience is quite a teacher, and I am… rather skilled at treating burns.” She scowled as she examined Byleth’s scalded flesh, which was already bubbling and blistering. “I… definitely overdid it,” she conceded. “I’m used to battling other fire elementals, and we all have heightened fire resistance.” Excuses. Everything she uttered just sounded like a pitiful excuse for her lack of restraint and her inability to control her own power. ‘I’m still so weak, still such a slave to my element,’ she thought bitterly as she rose to her feet. “Let me help you to the infirmary.”

Byleth tried to wave her hand dismissively and shake her off, but even that simple motion sent her off balance. “This hurts more than I expected,” she admitted, and for the first time, Edelgard could have sworn she saw a faint blush spreading across her teacher’s ashen cheeks. “I guess I’m not used to battling fire elementals.”

Edelgard chuckled softly as she straightened up beside Byleth and leaned against her, offering her body for support. Byleth happily obliged, tossing one arm around her shoulder and holding her other arm out to steady herself. “If it’s any consolation, I’m not accustomed to fighting wind elementals,” Edelgard reminded her. “The way you move so nimbly… it’s far different from the usual thrusts of power and force that fire elementals use.”

Byleth wrinkled her nose as she tried to shift more weight onto the smaller woman. Edelgard was plenty muscular, but she was also a few inches shorter, so the former mercenary had to lean more than either woman had expected. Edelgard’s face flushed as blue strands of hair swept into her field of vision and tickled her nose. ‘Do not sneeze on your teacher,’ she thought hastily. ‘Do not dare.’ Maybe she should try to hold her breath until the sensation went away.

That breath immediately gasped out of her startled lips as Byleth suddenly grabbed her hand and wrapped it behind the instructor’s back and onto her waist. “You need to hold onto me,” Byleth advised, “or we’ll both fall down.”

“R-right,” Edelgard stammered, floundering for breath like a flame without oxygen. “My apologies for giving you insufficient support, My Teacher.” She was making far too many errors today. Too many for a warrior. Too many for a princess. Too many for  _ the  _ famed Edelgard von Hresvelg, upon whose shoulders the entire Fire Empire rested.

“So,” Byleth began all of a sudden, and the warm breath against her face snapped Edelgard out of her frustrated stupor. “You’ve really never met any other wind elementals?”

Edelgard tried to shake her head, but she remembered that Byleth was leaning against her temple. Instead she mumbled, “No. We thought the entire bloodline of wind power had died out.”

Although Edelgard could not see her face, judging from the way Byleth’s body seemed to tense up beside her, the blue-haired woman was probably displeased. “But I’m right here, and I don’t have a special bloodline or anything. Jeralt doesn’t have any elemental powers.”

The princess considered her words for a moment. “What about your mother?”

“She died giving birth to me.”

Another insensitive slip-up. Edelgard was certain to strike out after this many mistakes. “My condolences,” she murmured. “Well, maybe we could try to research the Wind Country and learn more about its people,” she suggested, eager to change the subject away from Byleth specifically to her people as a whole. “We could learn more about the wind elementals.”

“More about me.”

She was sharp, Edelgard would admit that. “More about you, too,” Edelgard agreed. “If that proposition sits well with you. Some people would prefer to leave their lives shrouded in mystery. After all, ignorance is bliss.”

Byleth straightened up suddenly, as if a surge of power had raced through her. A surge of adrenaline, that had enabled her to overcome her pain. “I want to know,” she stated. Plain and simple… yet powerful and compelling. That, in a nutshell, was Byleth Eisner.

“We happen to have the most impressive library among the four kingdoms, second only to the Guardian of Light’s Crystal Citadel,” Edelgard boasted, and she stretched out to stand on her tiptoes to accommodate Byleth’s full height. “We will certainly uncover more information.” She snuck a glance at her instructor, whose usually stony face seemed to glitter with intrigue, as if hiding an unpolished gem.

“However, first we need to get you some burn cream!”

* * *

“My head hurts.”

Byleth groaned for what must have been the fourth time that afternoon. She was bright, but she probably was not accustomed to reading so deeply for so many hours.

For the first time, though, Edelgard felt compelled to agree. Even her head was swimming and her eyes were beginning to feel sore and dry. Right now, she almost wished she were a water elemental like her stepbrother, so that she could provide little water droplets to replenish her eyes. “I want to keep going,” Edelgard muttered through gritted teeth, “if only because I have yet to find anything of value.” How could the Fire Empire’s library, out of all of the places in Fodlan, not have any more information about the Wind Country? Edelgard scowled at her candle, which was practically just a lump of wax at this point. How long had they been reading? “Let’s try to summarize what we have learned,” she suggested, and the white-haired woman whipped out a fresh sheet of parchment. Carefully she dabbed her quill into her pot of ink, and then she lifted her head to nod at Byleth, signaling for her to begin.

Byleth rubbed her temples before starting. “Way back when Fodlan was formed, the Wind Princess had a country,” she recounted. “The Wind Princess created the Wind Country as a democracy, which used voting instead of lineage to decide who could rule.”

Edelgard nodded as she scribbled down her notes. “An interesting decision, given that elemental power is believed to be hereditary.”

“Believed?” Byleth echoed as she flipped through pages and pages, scouring for more substantive information. “You mean, you aren’t sure?”

Edelgard shrugged the question off as if it were nothing more than a leaf on her shoulder. “There are various theories on where our powers came from, but nobody knows for certain. All we know is that the crystals in the Crystal Citadel are the center, and elementals must have their own personal gems to filter, harness, and control that power.” She stopped writing for a moment to pinch her own ruby necklace between her fingers. “I nearly torched half of the Imperial Guard alive before we found a ruby that could contain my power,” she laughed. 

“Oh! Speaking of gems,” Byleth continued, “The Wind Princess used an opal.”

Edelgard nodded. “Correct. Opal.” She jotted that down. “Also, the wind elementals are strongest when their birthdays are close to the autumn equinox. Spring is for earth, summer is for fire, autumn is for wind, and winter is for water.”

Byleth leaned forward, bringing her face closer to Edelgard’s. “When’s your birthday?” she asked.

Edelgard tilted her chair backward, increasing the distance between them. She preferred not to let her teacher see just how little control she had over her own internal body temperature; when Edelgard blushed, her pale face illuminated like paper cast into a roaring fireplace. “June 22nd,” she replied as calmly as she could, silently cursing herself for letting such a simple motion fluster her.

Byleth returned to her seat, and Edelgard allowed herself to drop her chair onto all four legs again. “I don’t know how old I am, but I know my birthday is September 20th,” she told her. “So I guess that makes sense for a wind user-- What?”

The fire princess had slammed her hands down on the desk and leaped to her feet. The harsh clatter of wood hitting wood reverberated throughout the upstairs of the library as the princess’s chair clattered onto the ground. Ink splashed from the impact of Edelgard’s hands, and all of the candles in the room roared to life at once, both at occupied and unoccupied tables. “Your birthday,” she began in a booming voice, but as soon as the whispers of the other library patrons traveled to her ears, she lowered her voice to a hissing whisper, “your birthday is  _ two days  _ before the autumn equinox?” Not only had she found a wind elemental, but one who did not even realize just how powerful she was. For a moment, Edelgard felt her chest swell up with pride; she had held her own in their magic-based battles fairly well. She soon deflated, though, when she realized that Byleth probably hadn’t even been utilizing the full extent of her power, and Edelgard had slowly but surely been losing her advantage in elemental combat as Byleth trained and learned. In mere weeks, Byleth had accumulated power that nearly matched the famed flame princess.

Actually, her significant progress made sense now.

  
“It is?”

Edelgard’s pulsing purple gaze flashed onto Byleth, who was gazing up at her in confusion. Confusion and… awe? “Yes, My Teacher,” she murmured through gritted teeth.

Was Byleth Eisner… laughing?

Byleth clapped a hand over her mouth as a sound that resembled the unholy combination of a laugh and a hiccup escaped her lips. One hand wasn’t enough to hold her back, though; Byleth continued to snicker beneath her palm, and she swiftly clamped her other hand on top of it, as if trying to cage her laughter. “I hab neber seen you so angwy,” she mumbled through her fingers. “You newly set dis place abwaze!”

Had she? Edelgard’s still-smoldering eyes flickered around the room, and she noticed all of the candles, as well as the smoke from the fireplace on the first floor.

“You really are amazing,” Byleth wheezed, finally uncovering her mouth so that she could speak clearly. “I do not think I have the right to the title of your ‘teacher’, when you have taught me so much,” she went on, the light fading from her eyes as her tone took on its stoic, serious quality once again.

The princess twirled some loose white strands of her side ponytail around her fingertips, unable to meet Byleth’s gaze. “You’ve taught me plenty,” she tried to reassure her. As her embarrassed eyes danced around the room, watching as candles and wall torches finally died down from her fire and fury, she spotted a familiar forest-green head of hair pass behind a bookshelf. “Actually, I know someone who can be a teacher to both of us.” She stood up once more, but in a more dignified, refined manner this time. With her bold, authoritative voice befitting a royal speech or sermon, she called out, “Linhardt von Hevring! Dear librarian, I request--no, command--your assistance!”

Sleepy cerulean eyes peered out from behind a stack of books, and a resigned sigh escaped thin, pale lips. “Now, of all times?”

* * *

“Tell us everything you know.”

Byleth propped her foot up onto a stack of pillows on a couch in the librarian’s office. Edelgard sat beside her, trying to swallow her embarrassment as Byleth occasionally leaned against her arm or tried to rest her chin on the princess’s shoulder.

“I don’t think you can handle that,” Linhardt replied coolly. He sat cross-legged on his plush chair, propping his chin up with one hand while using the other hand to stir his tea with a small silver spoon. He gazed wistfully at the couch, as if wishing he were in Byleth’s position at the moment. “Can I take my nap now?”

Edelgard narrowed her eyes and lit a small flame above her cup of tea, bringing it to a near boil. “Let us just ask you a few questions,” she insisted. “Then you can sleep for the rest of the evening.”

Linhardt sighed and took a long sip from his teacup. “Very well, Your Highness. What  _ exactly  _ would you like to know? And…” He squinted at Byleth’s leg. “Not that it concerns me, but have you gotten any burn cream for that injury?”

Byleth sat up straight and tried to lean over to poke at her burn. “Oh. It absorbed all the cream already,” she observed. “We should visit the infirmary again when we’re finished here.”

“When we’re finished here,” Edelgard repeated, adding a little emphasis to the word “finished” and casting a cold glare at Linhardt. “Thank you for pointing that out, friend,” she said, trying to keep her voice level and civil. She and the librarian had been classmates long ago, and so she tried to keep herself to amicable relations with him. Despite his lazy attitude and his sleepy demeanor, he was absolutely brilliant and knew more about anything than anyone else in the Empire, if not all of Fodlan. He had even surpassed their old professor Hanneman in his knowledge of elemental theory. “I believe you’ve visited the Library of Light, correct?”

“Indeed,” Linhardt murmured, followed by a long, drawn-out yawn. “Alas, the Guardian would not let me take any books home with me to add to our collection, no matter how much I begged. She had books that could have occupied even me for months.”

Edelgard didn’t like the implications of his statement; was the Imperial Library insufficient to hold his interest? “The Light Library must have had books about the history of the kingdoms,” she went on, trying to home in on her goal. “Even the Wind Country.”

Absolute silence. Only the soft clatter of a teacup hitting a saucer shattered the stillness that ensued. Linhardt and Edelgard stared directly into each other’s eyes for several moments, as if waiting to see who would crack first. Would Linhardt spill his information, or would the princess’s temper flare up and force her to leave?

Byleth was the one who blew the tension away. She sighed and leaned back down, laying her head in Edelgard’s lap and staring up bemusedly at the princess’s face. “Your nose is so little,” she commented casually. “Smaller than your ruby necklace.”

“M-my Teacher!” Edelgard stammered, and she raised her hands up to cover her face, hoping to hide both her petite nose and her bright red cheeks. “Are you in such pain that you can no longer hold yourself up?”

Byleth shook her head, and her hair tickled the princess’s thighs. “No. I’m just getting tired of waiting,” she continued, turning her head over so that she was facing Linhardt. “We want to know about the Wind Country.” Her tone dropped to a low, almost threatening, whisper, as cold as a midnight gale. “Even if she weren’t your princess, she asked you a question. You should be kind enough to answer it.”

Was that a flicker of fear in the young man’s sleepy eyes?

The trace of emotion vanished as suddenly as it appeared, so Edelgard could not be certain. Linhardt mumbled around a yawn, “Yes, yes, I promise to answer you.” He lifted his arms above his head in a long stretch, then he folded his hands atop of his lap and tilted his body forward.

Edelgard, in turn, leaned forward to match his position, wanting to ensure that she could hear whatever secrets he was probably about to whisper like smoke on the wind. She was stopped short, however, by a dense mass in her lap that pressed against her bosom once she leaned forward too far.

“Oh. I can get up now.”

Byleth shuffled to squeeze her head out from between the princess’s lap and her chest, either completely oblivious to her blushing or choosing to ignore it. Edelgard couldn’t bring herself to meet Byleth’s eyes, but she did nod at her and mutter a quick, “Thank you.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Edelgard could have sworn she detected a faint blush on  _ Byleth’s  _ face. Much like Linhardt, however, this brief flash of emotion was fleeting and took to the sky faster than the princess’s mind could process it.

“Let’s start with what you know,” Linhardt coughed, completely unfazed by the scene that had just taken place before him. A trickle of amusement colored his usually bored tone, though, and Edelgard had half a mind to chastise him for it. Realizing that this would require her to bring the incident to everyone’s attention again, she opted against it and remained silent. “I don’t want to bore either of us or waste either of our time.”

Edelgard nodded in agreement. “Yes. Let’s cut to the important, substantive matters.” She dug a neatly folded sheet of paper out of her pocket and held it out to him. “This is what we were able to garner from our research in the Imperial Library.”

Linhardt gently opened the paper, and his eyes danced across the page as he rapidly read it, absorbing the information therein. “I see,” he murmured. “I had not realized how dire the situation was.” He lifted his eyes for a moment and bore his navy gaze directly into Edelgard’s lavender one. “The Imperial Library has next to nothing.”

The white-haired young woman fought the urge to become defensive. “The Wind Country disappeared generations ago,” she pointed out, trying (and perhaps failing) to keep her voice level. “The amount of literature from that time is limited, and all scholarship is purely speculative. Most of the works from that era are not very advanced, either,” she went on.

Linhardt waved his hand before his face. “Your Highness, I was not criticizing your library,” he stated bluntly, and Edelgard bit her lip in frustration. He was far too perceptive; the fact that Hubert had not eliminated him or attempted to do so was honestly nothing short of a miracle. “I love it here,” he reminded her. “I love sitting here among all of this knowledge. It is the finest library in Fodlan. I rarely get bored. But on that particular topic, this library is, unfortunately…” He paused and furrowed his brow, as if searching for the right word. “Lackluster.”

“Lackluster,” Edelgard scoffed. 

“Lackluster,” Linhardt repeated, seeming pleased with his choice. “Like the unpolished gem of a novice magic user. Let’s try to help it reach its potential, shall we?” He leaned back in his seat and rested his hands behind his head. “We need to go further back than just the history of the Wind Country, though. To understand what happened to the Wind Country, we need to contemplate where the elements even came from. Are you taking notes?” he asked suddenly, narrowing his eyes at her. “You might want to.”

Edelgard’s face grew hot as she reached into her satchel for another sheet of parchment and a quill. “You may proceed,” she told him once she was ready. 

Linhardt raised an eyebrow at Byleth, who had picked up a nearby book about swordplay and was completely tuned out of their conversation. “All right. As long as one of you is listening,” he murmured with a shrug. “Several theories exist as to how humanity gained control of the elements,” he began, and he raised his arms up to the ceiling. “Some theorize that it was a genetic mutation, and that as generations passed, more elementals had offspring and more people with the elemental gene tended to live longer, which is why so many humans now have some sort of elemental capabilities.” He then balled one hand into a fist. “Some propose that a meteor crashed into the planet, and that when it shattered, it left behind the crystals that are the core of our powers. The radiation from the meteor mutated some humans to be able to wield the elements.” He simulated a meteor crashing into the planet as he drove his fist into his opposite palm. 

The next hand motion, however, turned the corners of Edelgard’s mouth upward into a smirk. “Are those supposed to be claws?” she guessed as she narrowed her eyes at his bent fingers and his tense fingertips.

“Yes,” he confirmed. “And now wings.” He waved his arms up and down beside him. “The least popular theory, but one that some scholars maintain, is that dragons visited Fodlan and taught the humans how to wield the elements. Some had a natural aptitude while others did not, due to some variance in genetic makeup, I’m sure.” He put his arms back down by his sides and shrugged.

“Dragons,” Edelgard echoed in disbelief. The princess had seen many a wyvern in her day, usually working alongside blacksmiths, but _dragons_ were thought to be nothing more than legends. Nobody had ever seen a _dragon_ … or if they had, they had not lived to tell the tale.

“Personally, I favor the meteor theory,” Linhardt went on, clearly not willing to waste any time on such delusional fantasies. “That would explain why the crystals are the source of our powers.” He shifted slightly in his seat and leaned forward to wave his hand between Byleth’s book and her face. “Coincidentally,” he murmured, “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen your stone.” His tone was not skeptical nor suspicious. On the contrary, he seemed rather… intrigued. “I would love to feast my eyes on a functional opal.”

Byleth moved her hands so that her book could re-enter her line of vision. “Don’t have one,” she informed the librarian. “Sorry.”

All of the lights--the torches, the candles, the chandelier--in the room flickered out at once, as though a giant gale had blown them all out. Edelgard felt as though a cold wind had rushed down her spine and frozen all of her nerves, muscles, and bones.

A soft grumble beside her snapped her back to reality as Byleth shuffled and scooted upward into a sitting position. “I can’t read now.” The mercenary tried to look back and forth between the two fire elementals, using the faint light from the single window in the room as a guide. “Could one of you put the lights back on?”

“No stone,” Linhardt breathed. He reached out to light a soft pair of candles on the table before them. With an autumn birthday, Linhardt was one of the weaker fire users, but his steady hand was probably even more reliable than Edelgard’s right now. “Byleth,” he began tentatively, “When is your birthday?”

“September 20,” she replied, in the same matter-of-fact voice that she had used with Edelgard earlier. A simple declaration; she had no idea of the weight that her date of birth held.

Linhardt clapped his hands together, and for the first time that afternoon, he looked completely fascinated. Excited, even. “Two days before the autumn equinox,” he breathed. “I would conjecture that someone whose birthday was on the actual solstice or equinox may not need a stone, but alas, Her Highness needs one and she is also only two days shy of the summer solstice.” His eyes glimmered, and he rose from his chair to head over to a nearby bookshelf. “I managed to swipe a book or two from Lady Rhea’s library, but I do not recall a single mention of an elemental who did not need a stone.” He began flipping fervently through the pages, his eyes flying across words, sentences, paragraphs as he searched eagerly for some sort of clue. “The stone is like a human heart--the core part of the magical body that pumps magic like a heartbeat shows the pumping of blood.”

“Oh. Well, that explains it.”

Both of the fire users whipped their hands around to gaze at Byleth with bated breath. The dots were not connecting for either of the Fire Empire residents, and so they waited impatiently for her explanation.

However, she just gazed blankly back at them, as if the answer were obvious.

Edelgard gingerly reached forward and cupped her slender, gloved hands around Byleth’s thick, firm ones. “My Teacher,” she began gently, “what explains it? We don’t follow.”

Byleth’s eyes traveled back and forth from the princess to the librarian, as if she were genuinely surprised by their confusion. “I don’t have a heartbeat,” she told them, as simply as if she were telling them the weather or the time of day. “My heart has never once beat in my life.”

Edelgard’s grip went slack, and Byleth’s hands slipped out of hers like a paperweight hitting the ground. “N-no heartbeat?”

“No heartbeat,” Byleth confirmed. “Is… that not norm--oh, hello, Linhardt,” she greeted the librarian, wide-eyed, as he suddenly rushed forward and squatted beside the spot where she sat on the couch. Immediately he pressed his ear against her chest; he waited there for a few seconds, and then he reached up to press his fingertips just below her collarbone.

“Linhardt!” Edeglard gasped, suddenly rattled to reality by the abhorrent scene before her. “You cannot just rush up to a woman’s bosom and--”

“She’s right,” he whispered, his voice strained in his disbelief. “Her heart is still.” He leaned back onto his heels and rocked back and forth, hardly able to contain himself. “Amazing. Marvelous. A true scientific spectacle.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “It’s as though her heart is made of sto...stone….” He jumped up to his feet at once, his eyes as wide and round and deep as pools. He scurried back over to the bookshelf, rummaging around through the pages of the books he had smuggled in from Rhea’s library as well as the handwritten notes he had shoved haphazardly in between chapters.

“A stone?” Edelgard repeated. “Linhardt, you couldn’t possibly mean--”

“Oh, but I could, and I do,” he told her, his voice shrill with enthusiasm. “I heard rumors, you know, while I was at the Crystal Citadel. Rumors of attempts to infuse normal humans with elemental power.”

Edelgard’s hands balled slowly into fists. “Preposterous,” she muttered. “Without the right blood--”

“Without the right blood, a stone will not respond,” he finished, and he scowled as he dropped a book beside him onto the ground with a loud clatter. “But according to the rumors, a group of dastards was actually trying to grind up precious stones and infuse them into the blood of normal humans.”

Through gritted teeth, the princess hissed, “Insane. That would kill anybody, human or elemental.”

“But what if…” he went on, ignoring the princess’s tense tone and stiff stance, “what if an entire stone were placed into her body?” He turned back around and narrowed his eyes at Byleth. “Do you have any scars on your chest or torso? Anything that could indicate that a surgery had taken place?”

Byleth opened her lips to respond, but Edelgard swiftly swung her hand around to clap it over the older woman’s mouth, effectively silencing her. “You will not be dissecting my teacher,” she snarled, and she could feel the hair on the back of her neck beginning to rise. “Surely she has a stone and just doesn’t know about it. Her father may have sewn it into her clothes, or slipped it into the heel of her shoe, or…” Her voice trailed off as her confidence wavered. Linhardt was coming dangerously close to the truth.

“I have never seen skin so pale,” the librarian noted casually, trying to side-step the princess’s rage. He reached forward to gently pinch Byleth’s fingertips. “Almost as white as a cloud. Like an opal.” He then lifted his head to look at Edelgard, who was glowering down at him. “Snow white skin and snow white hair,” he murmured thoughtfully.

Not just the truth about Byleth, but the truth about her, too.

“You two make quite a pair,” was all he said before rising to his feet. “I wonder if, were there a Wind Country, Miss Byleth here would be a princess too.”

“Thank you for the tea.” Edelgard rose to her feet as well, her hand still firmly pressed against Byleth’s mouth. Her lips were surprisingly plump. “My teacher needs to return to the infirmary. Let us go, now. I will support you.”

A ferocious gust of wind slammed the door shut behind the two women as they departed.

* * *

That night, Edelgard took a little longer than usual to dim the lights in her bedroom.


	8. Chapter 7: Whirlwind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I am Byleth Eisner," she repeated, circling back to where she started.
> 
> The soft echo that reverberated around the narrow stone hallway chirped and chimed, "Byleth Eisner! Byleth Eisner!" but even hearing her name over and over could not calm the tumultuous tornado in her head.
> 
> "Byleth Eisner, you are so much more than you know."

“El,” Dimitri murmured as he stroked his fingertips over a painting in his bedroom. An oil painting of two young children, one with blond hair and one with tawny brown hair. The blond boy had big, curious blue eyes, and a shy smile as he held out a huge bubble in front of him. The brunette girl, on the other hand, smirked with confidence as she held bright white flames out on her fingertips in the shape of a heart. “You’ve always been so bold and so brave,” he mused, “but what happened to the laughter in your eyes?”

A sheepish son and a daring daughter. Two royals who were never meant to be related, but through the accident of marriage and remarriage, they had become stepsiblings by chance.

Through the accident of a castle encounter, they had become friends by choice.

Now, though, how would he characterize their relationship? They had remained close throughout the years by virtue of letters, diplomatic conferences, and even casual visits. But did he  _ really  _ know her any more? Ever since she vanished without reply for months, maybe years, only to reappear with bone-white hair and emotionless eyes?

“El… what happened all those years ago?”

His only reply came from the whipping wind outside his window.

* * *

Rain splattered against the stone walls vigorously, causing the interior of the castle to echo with their pounding. The windows clattered and shook as sharp gusts smacked them, as if threatening to shatter them should the residents of the Imperial Palace incur nature's wrath.

Even the storm raging outside, though, could not compare to the whirlwind of thoughts swirling inside Byleth’s mind. And so she drifted through the hallways of the palace like a wandering breeze, like a leaf floating on the wind without any clear destination.

An elemental. A princess. A stone. A heart.

Who was she, exactly? 

A whole week had passed since she and Edelgard had spent that afternoon in the library, and she was still as clueless as she was then. In fact, the more she thought about the situation, the more confused she became. The swirling and storming inside her mind had only increased in ferocity with each passing day. At least she could walk on her own now; it was as if fate was trading her physical pain for mental pain, tenfold.

"I'm Byleth Eisner," she whispered. She would benefit from starting with what she knew. "My father is Jeralt Eisner, a mercenary. My mother was Sitri Eisner, a…" Uncertainty clouded her vision. "My mother was Sitri Eisner." Best to leave it at that.

"I was a mercenary," she went on, "but now I am a battle instructor for the princess of the Fire Empire." That sounded almost aloud as it felt when she thought about it internally. "I like swords. I like fish. I like helping people." She rattled off these trivial facts as though she were reading a list. "My birthday is September 20-- apparently that's important."

A sharp smack from above caught her attention, and she tilted her head back to look up to see from where it had come. Wet leaves were plastered against one of the stained glass windows, obscuring the image therein. That beautiful young woman in the glass surely couldn't have green hair, after all. 'Then again, the librarian had green hair,' Byleth reminded herself as she turned back to the hallway and continued her ambling. Odd, but none of her concern. 

"I am Byleth Eisner," she repeated, circling back to where she started.

The soft echo that reverberated around the narrow stone hallway chirped and chimed, "Byleth Eisner! Byleth Eisner!" but even hearing her name over and over could not calm the tumultuous tornado in her head.

_ "Byleth Eisner, you are so much more than you know." _

The tree branches slapping the window almost seemed to be talking to her. Frowning in her frustration and faint flickers of fear, she cleared her throat and declared firmly, "I am Byleth Eisner!"

"You are  _ noisy. _ "

That deep, threatening growl of a voice definitely was not an echo. Thick, grey storm clouds rolled in above, blocking the sunlight from the windows. Byleth squinted in the faint torchlight, trying to make out the silhouette at the end of the walkway. Tall, dark, and brooding: that could only be one person she knew.

"Hubert," she guessed, and the lights around her roared to life as Edelgard's right-hand man stepped forward. He claimed to be just her retainer, but candidly, this was the first time that Byleth had seen him alone; he was attached to her like an alcoholic to the bottle, or like a dog to his master. He always seemed attached to Edelgard outside of her and Byleth’s private training sessions. At meals, at meetings, even when Edelgard had taken Byleth to the infirmary, Hubert seemed to be present. 

"Byleth Eisner," Hubert greeted her coolly. "At least, that is the name you have repeatedly professed today, so I most certainly hope it is yours."

"It is," Byleth affirmed. At least, to the best of her knowledge.

"I am glad," Hubert murmured, and he began to stalk forward, taking slow, long strides. "I would be… sorely disappointed if you had lied to Her Highness over something as simple as that." Suspicion and doubt rolled off of him in waves. Byleth had an inherently trusting nature, and so these things did not come naturally to her, but after watching Edelgard deal with so many of the nobles, guards, and citizens around the Empire, each with their own motives and their own drives… well, she had begun to pick up on subtleties that she may not have noticed before. 

"Are you looking for Edelgard?" Byleth tapped her chin thoughtfully. "I think she's still in her room. We were training pretty late last night, so--"

" _ Lady _ Edelgard," Hubert corrected her softly. "Lady Edelgard is not the one I seek, however. Miss Eisner, I wish to speak with  _ you _ ."

The way he emphasized his intent to see Byleth, specifically, made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Why did she feel so threatened by his mere presence? She had certainly dealt with a fair number of dastards before: murderers, thieves, plunderers. Why did Hubert's aura… surpass them all?

'But Edelgard trusts him,' she reminded herself. "Okay," she told him, nodding slowly. "What do you need?" She couldn't turn down a request from the princess's closest companion, especially if he needed her aid. 

"Much obliged," Hubert told her with the faintest flash of a smile. "Not here. I wish to speak to you in the training grounds." He spun on his heel to face the proper direction. "I wish to inquire into your progress with Lady Edelgard." He took one step forward, but then he paused, turning his head to cast a steely lime gaze back at Byleth. "If you have the time, of course."

Byleth hurried her pace to catch up with him. "You're Edelgard's friend. She trusts you, so I have time for you."

Hubert chuckled quietly and continued forward once again. "Very well. Thank you, Miss Eisner." He swallowed hard before speaking again. "Lady Edelgard trusts you as well, you know."

"She does?" Byleth asked, genuinely surprised. She didn't know what she expected to hear, actually. She admired the princess, her tenacity, her pride, her determination, her perseverance, her wit, her charm, her grace, her poise. To hear that someone like her could be so valued in Edelgard's eyes….

The wind seemed to push Byleth forward as though she were floating on a cloud, but she still remained one step behind Hubert and his lengthy strides. Hubert, who never looked back again for the rest of their trip.

* * *

"I once again thank you for your time," Hubert spoke at last once they reached the wood, dirt, and stone pit of the training grounds. "You see, I worry extensively about the princess's well-being."

Byleth carefully removed her cloak from her shoulders and hung it precariously from the tip of a wooden spear. Thankfully, since she was feeling better, she had planned for weapons training with Edelgard later today and already intended to visit the training grounds. Upon walking into the dirt arena in the pit of the room, she took a deep breath and stretched her arms above her head, reaching for the sky with her wiggling fingers. With a loud yawn, she bent over to touch her toes.

Wait. Hubert.

Realizing that Hubert had spoken to her, she cut herself off from her quick stretching session and jerked upright. “Sorry,” she said, although her monotone apology did not sound particularly remorseful. “I get fired up just being here.” What had he said? Something about Edelgard? “We train really well here. Edelgard has taught me so much.”

Hubert’s sharp jawline seemed to twitch, if she wasn’t mistaken -- but his expression soon relaxed as he slipped off his own coat to hang from the hilt of a hanging wooden sword. The Empire desperately needed to invest in a coat rack of some sort. “No need to apologize,” he told her, although his low, grumbling voice did not sound particularly reassuring. “The princess is incredible, is she not?” He pressed his fingertips together pensively. “Wise, skillful, acute, sensitive, stern, dedicated… Truly, the Fire Princess will be a glorious Flame Emperor, a bright beacon for not only the Empire but for all of Fodlan.”

Byleth nodded in agreement, but her eyes narrowed as Hubert’s voice drawled on. Something about the way he spoke was… menacing. His words were light and his voice was soft, but his low rumble almost resembled the crackling of a fireplace, sparking with suppressed hunger that was licking greedily at the air for more fuel, more oxygen. His smoldering eyes resembled embers that were almost, but not quite, expended, and thus would provide a nasty surprise for someone who may try to stomp on them to put them out. Even hunched over slightly as he was, his height cast shadows across the entire dirt arena, like the sun setting at the end of the day over the horizon.

Everything about him radiated with the energy, passion, and power of flint waiting to strike stone and set the world ablaze.

With a mere flick of the wrist, Hubert sent a fireball hurtling towards Byleth’s face. Her slitted eyes grew wide in shock as she jumped to the side, springing off of her good foot. The scent of singed hair wafted into her nose, and she sniffled and snorted to try to rid the acrid stench from her senses.

“I will be the oxygen to her flames,” Hubert grumbled. The princess’s retainer straightened up to his full stature and spread his arms out wide, and his shadow enveloped the arena as though nighttime had befallen the room. “You are a wind that threatens to blow her out.” He scowled and raised his chin so that he could glower at her. “You are an enigma, Byleth Eisner, and the more we learn about you, the clearer it becomes that you are a threat.”

Without waiting for a response, Hubert swung his arms in front of him and clapped his hands, sending a wall of flame hurtling towards Byleth, much faster than the fireball from before.

_ “You fool! Use the wind!” _

The harsh, critical, screeching voice in her head managed to keep her alive. Was that instinct? Adrenaline? Something else entirely? Byleth did not have time to contemplate what it was, for she was too grateful that it existed at all. Byleth stomped on the ground and pushed herself forward with two gusts of wind that blasted out from underneath her feet. Using their speed, she managed to narrowly avoid the inferno, but she could still feel the heat rolling off of it in waves. Heat that far exceeded any pain she felt from Edelgard’s minor burn.

A minor burn. Edelgard was certainly capable of more than that, but she had deliberately restrained herself. Hubert was making no attempt to contain his power.

Hubert was  _ trying  _ to kill her.

This wouldn’t be Byleth’s first brush with death, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last, but she was far more comfortable using swords and speed than gusts and gales. A wooden sword would be useless against a fire elemental, so she was going to have to rely on her own wits and wind to get herself out of this mess.

While these thoughts were rattling inside of her head, Hubert wasted no time in preparing a follow-up attack. He held his hand out in front of him and sent a thin streak of fire blazing out of his gloved palm.

Byleth dropped to the ground at once, watching with wide eyes as the flamethrower seared mere inches above her face. As much as she hated to admit it, she wasn’t nearly as deft in using her wind as Hubert was in using his fire. He had years of experience under his belt, whereas Byleth had only recently begun to learn that she could even harness the wind at all, never mind any unique tricks or strategies. She would have to stick to what she knew best.

At once, she boosted herself up onto her feet with a quick blast of wind, and then she dashed to the rack of wooden weapons lining the wall, keeping her eyes on Hubert all the while. Hastily she plucked a sword, and she whipped around to fully face her adversary once more. She jumped as little fireballs flew at her feet, using the wind to keep her aloft. Delicately she placed herself back onto the ground in the dirt floor of the training pit, her right hand clamped firmly around the hilt of her sword.

Fire was far more deadly than wind; at least, in her hands, wind was but a tool, an aid, not a weapon. She couldn’t craft the wind into different shapes and sizes like Hubert could do with his flames. But if Byleth Eisner knew anything, she knew her way around a sword.

Hubert chuckled as he saw Byleth plant her feet into the ground and hold her sword out in front of her. “I do hope you know that’s flammable,” he crooned. The dark-haired man snapped several times, and a circle of little flames popped up around his gloved hands. With one swift thrust, he sent them all flying at her like an assault of arrows.

How was she supposed to dodge all of those?

_ “Think, you fool! If they were actually arrows, how would you handle them?” _

Quite frankly, she would look for shelter, but in this wide expanse of dirt and clay, she had nowhere to hide. Her second option would be to try to deflect them with her sword, but how could a wooden sword fend off fireballs?

It was worth a try. Byleth slashed at the air as the first flame flashed by her left shoulder, and it dissipated. Her eyes grew wide and a light flashed inside her mind as understanding dawned on her. Whenever she slashed with her sword, she carved a path in the air. If she could direct the wind with those strikes….

The rest of the flames were in hot pursuit. Byleth gritted her teeth and cut one long, diagonal slash in front of her body, and she sent a cutting gale blasting forth in front of her. The fireballs split in half and fell to the floor harmlessly, torn apart by her power. With her own physical strength as a source and her elemental strength as support, she could do some hefty damage.

Perhaps even lethal.

Byleth dug her heel into the packed earth, and with a huff, she slashed forward in one swift, fluid vertical motion. The wooden blade sliced through the air, and Byleth, sensitive to the motion of the wind, propelled a gust forward and aimed it directly at Hubert.

Hubert was more agile than he looked; his lanky body maneuvered easily out of the way. He kicked to the side with his long legs, carefully avoiding the breeze that blasted past him. A smirk crept onto his thin lips.

That smirk swiftly soured into a scowl as a sharp rip cut through the air. Byleth gawked at the piece of fabric that fluttered in the air where Hubert had stood a mere moment before. Her eyes drifted immediately to Hubert, who seemed just as shocked as she did. His left sleeve was torn at the elbow, and the remnants of the crisp white fabric fell to the ground harmlessly.

White linen splattered with droplets of crimson.

For the first time, emotion flashed across Hubert’s face. Not anger. Not rage. Not disappointment. Not hatred.

Fear.

Hubert’s left arm hung at his side, and a single streak of red trickled down his forearm and began to saturate his snowy gloves. “Perhaps you are worthy of being Lady Edelgard’s teacher,” he murmured. Slowly he peeled off his first glove, carefully prying it from his slender fingers. “And that is all the more reason why I cannot allow you to see her again.”

Byleth’s stance remained firm as she planned another attack, but her knees suddenly buckled and her eyes grew wide as Hubert finished pulling off his gloves. At meals, at training, at the library, both morning and night, the young man had always kept his hands covered. Byleth had assumed it was a matter of modesty or maybe a disdain for germs. She never expected… this.

The skin on his hands was so thin that she could see the veins pulsing underneath. Thick, puckered scars crisscrossed its nearly translucent surface, as though someone had tried to stitch a pattern onto his hands like a canvas. Pale pinks and tans colored his palms with each of the scars, but even that was not as surprising as the swelling at the bases of his wispy fingers. Purples and pewters pulsed at his knuckles, and his fingers themselves were coated with long streaks of black. Surely that was ash. Surely that wasn’t his skin. Surely... 

She didn’t have time to ponder. Somehow, Hubert managed to snap his gnarled fingers, generating little sparks at the tips. With a flick of his wrist, he sent some of these sparks hurtling towards her.

Without his gloves to contain his power, the blazing barrages moved faster than before. Byleth took a deep breath and slashed at the air again, hoping to dissolve these sparks like she had the fireballs previously.

_ “No!” _

A rookie mistake.

The sparks burst to life, exploding in midair as soon as her gusts struck them. The original sparks served as their core, and as they ignited, sparkling reds, oranges, and blues blazed outward. Byleth only had time to raise her hands and shield her face as traces of sparks zapped at her skin, speckling her flesh with searing burns. She roared in pain as the flames kissed her exposed arms and legs, and frantically she shook her limbs to try to cast them off.

Without wasting any time, Hubert snapped again, eager to send more sparks her way. Byleth lowered her arms so that she could see him. Did he take her for a fool? She wasn’t about to try the same tactic twice. Byleth clenched her teeth to bite back her agony as she kicked off against the ground, using the wind to propel her to the side and out of the way of the sparks. If she kept her wind to herself, then nothing would set off the little firecrackers and cause them to burst. But if she kept her wind to herself, how could she attack?

As soon as her feet hit the ground, Byleth thrust the tip of her sword forward. A small tornado blasted forth from her jab, and even Hubert wasn’t swift enough to dodge. The attack struck him directly in his ribcage, and he gasped as it knocked the wind out of his lungs. The assault threw him onto his back, and he landed with a harsh thud. 

If nothing else, the momentary lapse gave Byleth a moment to examine her injuries. Her skin was already starting to swell. Little cinders dotted her arms and legs alike; thankfully, they weren’t deep, but the burning sensation did not feel nor smell particularly pleasant.

A low groan redirected Byleth’s attention, and the blue-haired woman readied her sword in front of her as Hubert pulled himself up into a sitting position. He gingerly held one hand to his abdomen, and he tutted under his breath. “Nothing I cannot handle, I assure you,” he hissed as he carefully got back up onto unsteady feet. With a slight cough, he planted one foot behind him and placed the other in front, bending his knees slightly to help ground himself firmly. He raised his hands before him and then shook his head, sending his greasy black bangs bouncing back and forth. “I really hoped I would not have to go to such lengths against you.”

The skin beneath his bangs was just like that of his hands. Thin, puckered, scarred, and where his eye was--or should have been--blacker than the night.

Byleth did not have time to question what he meant; she would see for herself soon enough. Hubert clasped his hands together and interlaced his mangled fingers as though he were praying. When his hands parted, however, the gift that graced them could only have been a gift from a devil, not a goddess. Blue flames fluttered in his palms, and their blazing, burning intensity mirrored that of Byleth’s cobalt-colored eyes. The flame gently flew into the air, but then with one wave of his hand, it hurtled toward Byleth as fast as a shooting star.

She couldn’t dodge. She couldn’t risk it exploding. She couldn’t…

_ “Fight fire with fire, you fool! Take that attack and push it somewhere else!” _

Push it somewhere else? Whatever this sixth sense was, it hadn’t failed her yet, and so Byleth just nodded as she dropped her wooden weapon and instead held her hands out in front of her. Feel the wind. Feel the air currents that fluttered around her. Hot, cold, wet, dry. Feel her nerve endings respond to the power that she could generate. Feel her blood pumping and pulsing with the elemental platelets that flowed in her veins.

Byleth thrust her hands forward with all of the power that she could muster, and a wall of wind erupted from her palms. The cerulean cinders came screeching to a halt, and then much to her surprise, they went hurtling back in the other direction. Fight fire with fire.

The blazing blue ball flew towards Hubert, who tutted again as he raised a wall of fire to catch it in its tracks. Periwinkle melted into pumpkin as the orange and red inferno ate the blue ball alive. If Byleth was to counterattack effectively, her winds would need to be stronger. Faster. Harsher.

She gritted her teeth and held her hands out in front of her, waiting for Hubert to attack again. Now that he saw she was capable of countering, how would he react?

Another blue ball of flame popped up between his palms. This time, however, he punched it, and it fell apart like a meteor shower, with dozens of smaller blue flames flying towards her. Could she send them all back?

“Farewell, Princess of Wind.”

The smaller size made them faster, and Byleth did not have time to react. She couldn’t even fetch her sword, which laid uselessly at her feet. Instead she pressed her fingers together and tensed her hands. She cut the air with her knife-hand strikes, hoping they would be sturdy enough to send off the flames.

Some of them missed her entirely. Some of them were deflected by her handy gusts.

One of them scraped her shoulder. One of them licked her ribcage.

And one of them squarely struck the boot of her still-healing leg.

Byleth collapsed onto her knees, wheezing as the heat sent her mind spinning. Even without direct hits, the intensity of the blue flames was such that the pain was already almost unbearable.  _ “Get up!”  _ The adrenaline pumping in her body screamed at her, urging her muscles to pick her up and help her move again. With the whirlwinds of pain zipping around her mind and blurring her vision, however, she was struggling to even determine which way was up. Blindly she threw her hands around on the ground, searching for her sword. As soon as her fingers came into contact with that solid wood, she greedily clawed at it and pulled it into her grasp. Byleth placed both hands around the hilt of her sword and jammed the tip downward into the dirt, using the sword like a cane to help prop herself up into a standing position. While she knelt over her sword, mind racing, she could hear a ferocious, intense pounding in her ears. Was it her blood? Was it the pain? What exactly was creating this rhythmic, steady pounding? The ache in her chest yearned for answers.

The temperature in the room suddenly dropped, but Byleth hardly noticed as she continued to pant and gasp standing over her sword. She raised her head as high as she could muster, and she turned her steely blue gaze onto Hubert, who, much to her relief, looked winded and battered as well.

For a split second, so quick that it could have been an illusion, Byleth’s eyes glimmered green.

A white, crystalline light poured forth from Byleth’s skin, as if emanating from her chest. Wisps of wind began to slice through the air, heading directly for the young woman in the center of the pit. She attracted them like moths to a flame, as they whistled and whipped through the air to reach her, circle around her, protect her. Byleth was the eye of the storm that had generated in the training grounds.

Both hands still firmly grasping the hilt of the sword, Byleth began to draw it from its dirt sheath, freeing it from the ground. She could stand on her own two feet. She could rely on the wind to keep her up. She could--

The former mercenary rapidly blinked as darkness suddenly descended upon the arena. A huge smokescreen erupted forth from where Hubert had been standing a moment before. The wind continued to blast and breeze throughout the room, quickly tearing apart the cloud of smoke. But when the smoke had finally cleared, Hubert was nowhere to be seen. Her bewildered gaze danced around the room, searching desperately for the greasy-haired young man, but he had entirely abandoned the fight.

The white glow faded away into obscurity, and the winds circling around Byleth blew out, melting into the air. With a huge sigh, Byleth planted her sword into the ground again and leaned upon it for support. Hubert, for whatever reason, was gone.

She could breathe again.

“Infirmary,” Byleth whispered. Bringing a wooden sword throughout the palace was out of the question, so she was going to have to try to walk there on her own. She began to hobble towards the wall, dragging her bad foot behind her so as not to put any unnecessary weight on it. If she could reach the wall, she could have proper support.

Carefully, carefully Byleth inched forward. She breathed a sigh of relief once her hands slapped onto the sturdy stone. “Infirmary,” she repeated as she slid her hands across the wall, leaning on it for aid as she stumbled out of the training grounds and back down the hallway to the main castle.

At this hour, Byleth hoped not to encounter a soul. In fact, she almost expected to be completely alone for her journey to the medical wing, except for maybe spotting a guard or two on duty. Least of all did she expect to find a familiar, friendly face heading straight down the hall to the training grounds, almost immediately after her departure.

“My teacher!” Edelgard called out to her, waving enthusiastically. She seemed particularly chipper this morning. “I was going to ask you to accompany me to breakfast, but you were not in your room. Knowing how dedicated you are to training, I deduced that you might be here, but alas, it seems I came at the end… of your… session…” The lightness in her voice died away as she drew closer and saw what state Byleth was currently in: singed hair, dull eyes, ashy face, burnt flesh, and limping leg. 

“My teacher!” Edelgard cried out in horror, and she lifted her skirts to dash forward rapidly. “What in Fodlan happened to you?” she demanded at once, as she reached forward to wrap one arm around Byleth’s shoulders and the other around her waist. Byleth was more than happy to lean against the younger woman for support, but she winced and murmured a soft whelp of pain as Edelgard clamped her hands around the burn on Byleth’s side. Edelgard immediately withdrew her hands, which was probably more of a mistake than a blessing, because Byleth stumbled and collapsed right back onto the wall. “I will get you assistance at once,” she promised. “There’s a guard stationed not too far from here. Please, my teacher…

“Stay with me.”

* * *

“What happened?”

As always, Edelgard left no time for idle chitchat-- she was cutting straight to the heart of the matter. She dabbed at Byleth’s ribs with burn cream as the pair sat down on a cot in the infirmary.

“I was… sparring,” Byleth began cautiously, wincing as Edelgard applied the balm. Could she really call it that? The murderous intent in Hubert’s attacks, the bloodlust in his eyes, the hatred in his voice… could she call their encounter a mere sparring match?

Byleth did not need to worry about semantics, however, because Edelgard called her out on her obvious fib at once. “I’ve seen you spar, my teacher, and I know you are not this careless. A simple sparring session would never leave you in this state.” She frowned as she waved her hand over Byleth’s side, as if trying to help the salve dry faster. “These burns must have come from direct hits. You were not sparring; you were  _ fighting. _ ” She shuffled to Byleth’s other side to slap some cream onto the older woman’s shoulder.

“Ouch.”

“If you want me to be gentle, then do not lie to me,” Edelgard chided. Despite her harsh words, her next touch was far more gentle as she lightly brushed another slab of cream onto Byleth’s charred skin. “This was a purely elemental battle, was it not?” she guessed. “I do not see a single scratch on you. Just burns.” She sighed as she finished up the jar of cream she was using and rose to fetch another one. “The nurse is going to be furious when she sees how much medicine I used on you.”

Byleth shuffled uncomfortably as she tried to keep herself sitting upright, but eventually she acquiesced to her pain and allowed herself to lie down on the cot. Edelgard seemed somewhat surprised by Byleth’s change in pose, but she did not comment; instead she just silently unscrewed the cap of the next jar of salve with her sticky gloves.

“Technically,” Byleth murmured, and Edelgard’s head perked up. “I used a sword.”

The princess raised an eyebrow at that declaration. “We only have wooden weapons in the training grounds,” she pointed out. “You used a wooden sword to fight a fire elemental?”

Byleth’s face felt uncharacteristically hot as she nodded sheepishly. “I like swords. They make me feel comfortable.” Eager to change the subject, she asked, “Where is the nurse, by the way?”

Now it was Edelgard’s turn to blush. “She is… attending to other business,” she explained carefully. “I… requested some privacy.”

Byleth shuffled around on the cot so that she was lying on her side; the pain that shot through her arm soon convinced her to turn back and lie flat again. “Well, you are doing a fine job, Nurse Edelgard.”

Edelgard scowled as she applied little dots of cream to the burns that speckled Byleth’s thigh. “That’s Lady Nurse Edelgard to you,” she corrected her. Was that… a _ smile _ on the troubled princess’s face?

“Thank you, Lady Nurse Edelgard,” Byleth told her, and she felt the corners of her own mouth twitch upwards as she said those simple words. “Hubert would kill me if I did not use the proper terminology.”

Hubert.

Even without any hints on Byleth’s blank face or in her usual level tone, Edelgard managed to put the pieces of the puzzle together. “Hubert,” she repeated. “He… he would not dare.” Her ruby necklace flashed, and her face soon took on a similar shade of red. 

“Edelgard. Edelgard.” Byleth tried to catch her attention. “Your hands are too hot.”

Edelgard pulled her hands back at once; she must not have realized that she had begun to use her fire powers. “I am… usually much better at keeping my emotions in check.” She looked down sorrowfully at her gloved fingers, then turned a sad gaze onto the older woman. “Byleth, I am… so sorry,” she whispered through gritted teeth. Was she apologizing for almost burning her, or for something else entirely?

Byleth didn’t even take time to consider which option seemed more likely. She instead noticed something even more important. “You called me Byleth,” she murmured. “Instead of your teacher.”

The princess’s nose and cheeks turned crimson once again. “M-my apologies, m--”

“No, no, I like Byleth,” the former mercenary reassured her. “I am Byleth Eisner. Nothing more, nothing less.” Hubert’s final words to her echoed ominously in her mind.  _ Princess of Wind. _ Linhardt and even Edelgard herself had noted how eerily close her birthday was to the autumn equinox. The idea of being a princess, though… was almost too much for her to bear.

Byleth groaned, unable to deal with the pounding in her head. She closed her eyes and extended her arm out to Edelgard. “I am Byleth Eisner, and I am your teacher.” She smiled softly. “I am Byleth Eisner, and no matter what anyone says or does, I am not leaving you.”

Warm, mint-scented breath suddenly danced around Byleth’s nose. “Your poor hair,” Edelgard murmured, her voice soft and light against Byleth’s ear. “You must wash it later.” She began to tease her fingers through the azure locks. “Your face didn’t get burns, though; just a little dirty with ash. Let me wipe that off.” Gentle strokes from satin gloves brushed against her cheeks. 

Slowly, deliberately, carefully, Byleth allowed her eyelids to flutter open a bit. Just enough to see Edelgard’s eyelashes, so close that when she blinked, they tickled Byleth’s face.

“I cannot apologize enough… My Byleth.”

Warmth rushed through Byleth’s body as firm, moist, and soft lips pressed against her own chapped ones. The princess’s face was so hot that she was nearly burning Byleth’s cheeks-- or was that the former mercenary’s own blush that made her face so blisteringly warm? Edelgard’s lips sank into hers, threatening to devour her lips and take them for herself. ‘Take them,’ the blue-haired woman thought as she greedily pressed up and reciprocated. ‘Warm me up from the inside. Warm up this cold, ashen body.’

Warmth. Comfort. Passion. Home.

These were the last feelings that Byleth Eisner felt before her mind suddenly dropped back and faded into blackness as her consciousness slipped away.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Our beautiful art for this chapter comes from Phatom12 once again! Thank you so much, my wonderful partner!


	9. Chapter 8: Tornado

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Byleth needs to act fast, before time runs out.

“You  _ fool _ !”

Byleth winced as a harsh, critical voice assaulted her ears. Honestly, she deserved such criticism; she had been careless in her duel against Hubert, and Byleth had anticipated that as soon as Edelgard learned the truth of their encounter, she would scold them both relentlessly.

Except… that was not Edelgard's voice. That was an even more familiar friend: the whispers of the wind that had accompanied Byleth for her entire life.

When Byleth’s eyelids fluttered open, however, she did not expect to see the "wind" staring back at her.

Byleth awoke to find herself standing in a throne room, although it was not the one of the Imperial palace. Instead it was darker and damper, shrouded by dark clouds and encasing her in walls of stone.

"Ah. I suppose you need some help to see me."

A single snap echoed throughout the room, and torches along the walls roared to life. The damp quality of the air dissipated, replaced by a soft, warm, tickling breeze. Vines began to grow beneath her feet, extending from the ground until they reached the foot of a stone staircase, as though marking her path like a long carpet rolled out before her. 

Byleth followed the delineated path, carefully placing one foot in front of the other. She prepared for pain to sear through her burnt leg as she moved, but much to her surprise, she was fleet-footed and light once again. The blue-haired woman reached up to brush her bangs out of her face, only to notice that the stinging sparks and soothing salve were completely absent from her arms.

Was this some kind of… afterlife? Byleth had never been a huge believer in the notion, but when she looked up and saw a glowing figure perched on a stone throne, she began to seriously question if maybe some sort of goddess ruled over the land after all.

"Just as I suspected," the wind murmured once more. Except she clearly was not just the "wind." As Byleth’s eyes adjusted to the din, she became able to distinguish the silhouette of a young girl, with a satin, flowing gown of amethyst; long, thick hair like jade; and twinkling, critical eyes of aventurine. The vines continued to crawl and creep up from the ground and along the staircase until they reached her petite, pearly hands. "She really is trying to… oh, are you ready to listen to me now?" She tilted her head to the side and folded her arms across her chest. "As I was saying… You're a fool!" She straightened up in her chair in order to glower at Byleth, who stood dumbstruck at the foot of the stone staircase. 

"Although… I suppose that if you don't know the value of your own life, you aren't likely to protect it very well." She sounded sorrowful as she leaned forward to plant her elbows on her thighs and her chin in her palms. "Isn't that right… Princess Byleth?"

_ Princess. _

A peculiar sensation began to rumble in Byleth's stomach as her mind swirled with fretful thoughts once more. "You… have the wrong person," she managed to squeeze out, even as her lungs gasped for breath, for clarity, for familiar air.

"Excuse me?" The girl leaned back in her seat and planted her hands on her hips. She propped her chin upward and scowled sharply as she gazed down at Byleth. "Do you take  _ me  _ to be a fool? Or perhaps you see me as a lost, misguided child?" She slammed her hands down on the armrests of her throne. "How many times has this  _ child  _ saved your life? What does that make you, Byleth?"

She certainly was quick to drop the "princess" title as soon as her temper stirred. "Um…" Byleth began to twirl the ends of her hair. "Less than a child?"

The corners of the girl's mouth twitched upward. Seeming pleased, she folded her arms across her chest once more. "Perhaps you aren't a lost cause after all, Princess." She said the word again. The word that sent Byleth's body and mind into a tornado of turmoil. "Yes, you. The long-lost princess of the Wind Country." Her gaze suddenly softened. "I've been watching from the sky for far too long, and I had accepted our fate when the wind elementals were wiped out.

"But because of her, and because of you, we weren't."

_ Our fate. We. _

"I… Who are you, exactly?" Byleth stammered. "You've always been with me, but I don't even know your name."

A soft sigh escaped the girl's lips like a butterfly kiss. "I've always been with you, through no fault of your own." Why did she sound so… sorrowful? "The least I can do is introduce myself.

"My name is Sothis, but you probably know me as the first Guardian of Light."

Byleth sat down directly onto the icy stone floor.

"Get up!" Sothis barked at once. "You look as though you've seen a gho-- I am  _ not  _ a ghost!" she cried out incredulously. "No, I am very much alive and well!"

"You lived centuries ago," Byleth pointed out cautiously. "I read that in a book." She paused as she tried to recount all of the texts she had read while studying with Edelgard. "A book… or two. Maybe five." The numbers weren't important-- she had read that information  _ somewhere. _

"Yes, well, you can thank the current Guardian of Light for our… predicament." Sothis sighed. "My heart beats-- or rather, it doesn't, but I digress-- because of you." She raised her right arm to point at Byleth, and as soon as she did so, a white glow began to emanate from the young woman's chest. Just like in her battle against Hubert. "Your librarian friend is far too keen for his own good," Sothis murmured. "Somehow or another, my stone has ended up inside your heart."

"Your stone?" Byleth repeated. "As in… elemental stone?"

Sothis nodded slowly. "I am glad you are keeping up." Another smirk crawled onto her face, but her lips locked into a solemn, serious expression once more as she continued. "I was the first princess of wind, born on the 20th of the Horsebow Moon."

September 20th. 

"But when the dragons entrusted me with the task of overseeing the elements--"

Byleth raised her hand, but instead of waiting for permission, she began to speak immediately. "Wait. Dragons? It  _ was  _ dragons, and not a meteor or a genetic mutation or something?"

Now Sothis was the one who looked perplexed. "A meteor?" she echoed. "What in the… I rescued a dragon in my youth, and to thank me, she and her children taught me how to wield the elements." The green-haired girl held out her hand, palm facing upwards towards the ceiling. "The dragon of water," she began, and she crafted a serpentine figure out of the crest of a small wave. "The dragon of earth," she went on, and the water droplets evaporated as Sothis produced a wooden reptilian sculpture with sturdy legs and wide scales. "The dragon of fire," she murmured as she sent the wooden figure alight in an inferno, forming a broad-shouldered creature with thick, leathery wings. "But the dragon of wind took to me especially well," she finished as she produced a gust that took the shape of an "S" with feathery plumes protruding from its back and talons on its feet. "She was the first one to give me a stone: the opal now residing inside your chest." As Sothis concluded her presentation, she placed her hands in her lap and looked side to side uncomfortably. For the first time, she looked a bit… sheepish. "That stone is the reason why your heart doesn't beat."

"That stone is the reason I am alive," Byleth countered. In how many battles had the wind come to her aid to lend her strength and speed? In how many hunting expeditions had she relied on the wind not to carry her scent to her prey? In how many instances, both major and mediocre, had Sothis whispered to her? "But why tell me now? I am… twenty-five years old," she tried to recall the time frame that Edelgard had set forth with her on the day they met.

"My voice only reaches you," Sothis explained. "You are the last one besides her who bears my blood. That is why our hearts were compatible."

Her. Who is the woman to whom Sothis kept referring? "My father is still alive," Byleth reminded her. "I'm not the only one."

Sothis rolled her eyes and raised a hand to her temples. "Your  _ mother  _ was my descendant. We are connected through her. Since she has passed… You're the only one who I can warn."

"Warn?" Byleth repeated, but as Sothis raised her hand to silence her, the former mercenary clamped her mouth shut.

"When elementals die, they return to the elements from whence their powers came," Sothis told her. "Proof that we are all part of something bigger than ourselves… as much as some of the cockier elementals like to forget that." For some reason, a ginger-haired young man popped up in Byleth's mind, but she couldn't remember who he was or why she knew him. She ignored the thought and kept listening to Sothis. "As the Guardian of Light, the dragons turned me into a star when… when my term expired."

"When you died."

"Do I look dead to you?" Sothis snapped. She cleared her throat before continuing. "Anyway, I… my term ended during the Blue Sea Moon, which you probably know now as the Blue Sea Star Moon." She puffed out her chest. "Yes, I had a whole moon named after me." 

July. Byleth counted on her fingers. That was roughly three months away. "So I can see you again in three months?" she guessed.

Sothis shook her head. "No, but my presence will be strongest. Strong enough that, if someone could harness the full power of the elements, the full power that the dragons entrusted to me…

They could bring my physical body back to life."

Back to life. "So, you are de--"

"That's not the point!" Sothis insisted, slamming the palms of her hands down on the throne's stone armrests. "When I say the full power, I mean the  _ full  _ power! Every drop of magic contained in the crystals!"

Byleth looked down at her breast, from which a soft glow still poured forth. "But the stone fragments all have part of the elemental powers. They'd have to gather every stone in Fodlan."

Sothis shook her head sadly, sending her thick jade braids whipping back and forth. "The stones all trace back to the crystals. With enough practice and power, someone could siphon the power of the stones and drain them dry."

Byleth tapped her chin thoughtfully. "But the only one with access to the crystals is--"

"The Guardian of Light."

The two women locked eyes, and a silent understanding passed between them.

"I have to stop her."

"Yes, you do," Sothis agreed. "But she has had control of the crystals for decades. She's had plenty of time to practice using all five elements."

Decades. Byleth had only truly known about her powers for a couple of months. How could she counter that level of expertise?

"What you lack in experience, you make up for in sheer power," Sothis told her, as though sensing her apprehension. "Rhea's birthday is January 11th. Her ties to her natural-born element of wind are average at best. If you gathered all four of the royals, your sheer power combined would stand a chance against her."

Byleth gently placed one hand on her chest. "And if we don't?"

Sothis' gaze drifted upward, and if Byleth wasn’t mistaken, she thought she saw tears welling up in the girl's crystalline eyes. 

"Then the elementals will lose all of their magic to the hands of the Guardian of Light, who is supposed to safeguard their power, and the dragons will seek revenge for abusing their gift." She turned a cold, empty, mournful expression onto Byleth. "The world as we know it will come to an end. I will be brought back to life, only to see the Fodlan I created be turned to ash."

Images began to flash through Byleth's mind. Fire, water, earth, and air revolting against the land. Men burning. Women suffocating. Children drowning. All returning to the merciless earth.

"I know the Princess of Fire, and she knows the Prince of Water." Byleth clutched her chest tightly. "I… I am the Princess of Wind." She wrinkled her nose in confusion. "Where in the world is the Earth royal? The Earth Nation had been subsumed by the Fire Empire."

A soft chuckle emanated from Sothis' lips. "Just as the Wind Princess survived without a country proper, so does the Earth Princess." Sothis lifted a finger, and a tumbleweed appeared in her lap. She pushed it down the stairs, allowing it to toss and turn and flip and flop until it reached Byleth’s feet. "She has been a lot closer to you during your life than you ever realized."

Byleth knelt over to pick up the tumbleweed, an all too familiar relic of the Desert Lands. Her former home.

Would she consider the Imperial capital to be her home now?

"May the dragons light your path," Sothis murmured. "Fire, water, earth, air, and the Immaculate One." She clasped her hands together, and as soon as she did, the scene began to melt away. "Take care, Byleth Eisner. If you need me… just look to the stars."

* * *

"You  _ fool _ !"

Byleth slowly blinked her eyes open, expecting to see Sothis scowling down at her again.

This voice did not belong to Sothis, though. It was softer and less shrill, but also colder.

And over the past few weeks, it had become even more familiar than those whispers on the wind.

"E...del...gard?" Byleth's voice sounded so ragged that it was almost foreign to her. She tried to sit up, but the pain that raced through her body easily convinced her to stay put.

The fire elemental nearly jumped out of her chair beside Byleth's cot. She whirled around and knelt down beside Byleth so that the two were eye-level with each other. "Thank goodness you're awake…." Edelgard breathed. She reached out with a shaky hand to brush some of Byleth's bangs behind her ear. Why was Byleth's forehead so… sweaty? "I thought I had lost you, and I thought I had  _ this  _ imbecile to blame!" She narrowed her eyes and cast a furious glare across the room. In a cot opposite Byleth's-- quite literally at the far end of the room, as far away from hers as possible-- a flustered Hubert was lying down, staring at Edelgard's feet but unable to meet either of the women's eyes.

"Please... don't be mad at him," Byleth rasped. Edelgard immediately swung a glass of water over from a nearby table. "Thank you," she murmured. The older woman took a deep breath as she struggled to push herself into a sitting position again, ignoring the tingling running up and down her arms, legs, and obliques. "We don't have much time."

"Much time for what?" Edelgard pressed gently. "Byleth, are you all right?"

Byleth shook her head as she gulped down the water. "Please listen," she urged as she placed the glass back into Edelgard's outstretched hands.

"I will always listen, My Teacher," Edelgard whispered. Gently she put the cup on the table before reaching out to cup Byleth's cheek with her gloved hand. "But first, you need rest."

"But if we don't go to the Desert Lands soon, dragons will destroy Fodlan!" 

Edelgard leaned back, as though taken aback by this sudden outburst. Rather than furious or frustrated, though, she mainly seemed… confused. Even Hubert had poked his head up to look at Byleth now, utterly captivated by her bold proclamation. "Byleth… I'm going to need you to start from the beginning.”

* * *

Bubbling. Boiling. Bursting.

The pot of stew before Dimitri simmered and shivered as he toyed mindlessly with the water in its depths. 

"Your Highness," a gentle but deep voice grumbled as a tall, broad man slid in beside the prince. "You must eat," he insisted, his voice caring but firm.

"Dedue," Dimitri began, his voice barely above a whisper. "You take all of this time to cook splendid meals for me. Meals from your heart. From your homeland." He tightened his grip around his spoon. "Your homeland that you lost… because of  _ her _ ."

Dedue shuffled uncomfortably beside him. "I have no regrets," he murmured. "I am honored to live for you and help my culture live on." 

Dimitri slammed his other fist down on the table. "Yet I cannot even taste your efforts! The fruits of your labor!" he hissed. "Because of  _ her _ !"

Dedue curled his hands around Dimitri's, but the prince shrugged them off. "For how many years had she pretended to be my support? To show me sympathy?" Tighter, tighter.

The spoon snapped in two, and Dimitri dropped the pieces onto the table without another word. He rose to his feet and walked away, grumbling incoherently under his breath.

Dedue's gaze flickered back and forth between the boiling stew and the boiling prince, unsure of what to do next.

"May I…?"

A timid, cornflower-haired girl peeked from around the corner of the kitchen. "I will… try to… console him," she whispered.

Dedue smiled softly as the girl stepped forward, bowing slightly before him. "Marianne. Thank you." He scraped up the shattered spoon remnants. "And I will save this for him for later. He will need his strength, after all."

Marianne nodded in agreement. With unsteady hands, she pulled a small bouquet of forget-me-nots out of her satchel. Carefully lifting her skirts, she hopped up onto the table and reached over to place a flower behind Dedue's ear. "We will get through this," she murmured.

Dedue nodded sternly in agreement. "We will save him from himself, no matter what," he insisted. "Before it's too late."


	10. Chapter 9: Buds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A shadow library. A forgotten princess. A lost kingdom.
> 
> A new hope.

“Ohohoho!”

A boisterous laugh erupted from the bold blonde’s lips as she withdrew a book from the shelf before her. “This! This is exactly what I have been looking for!”

In the Imperial library of the Fire Empire, she surely would have received a harsh scolding and shushing for her outburst. In fact, the scholars there were so studious and stern that they may have expelled her at once, for the rest of the day… if not permanently. 

However, here in the Shadow Library, hardly any wandering souls would waste their time trying to silence her. For one thing, this library was a hidden gem in the Desert Lands, underneath one of the few solid plateaus that existed beyond the vast swaths of deserts and dunes that characterized most of the terrain. While rogues, vagabonds, and scoundrels roamed free along the surface--

Well, plenty of thieves and rascals lived underground, too. But at least the ones in Abyss were  _ trying  _ to build better lives for themselves and their families.

Abyss. A rather depressing name for a vibrant, lively underground community. Their way of life was simple, but nonetheless fulfilling. The outcasts of society could live here and eat, drink, buy, sell, pray, play, spar, and… to put it in a word,  _ live _ .

They could also read, but the blonde was one of the few who ever actually came to the Shadow Library for academic pursuits. Most of the visitors here simply sought out “banned” books for adult pleasures, or they searched for tomes of forbidden magic to snap back at their enemies or snap up some spare change.

“From Abyss to bliss,” the young woman murmured as she plopped her newfound book on a rickety old table in the library. She coughed as a cloud of dust and dirt blossomed forth from the sudden impact, as though the table had not been used in years. “This tome will provide me with the means to bring the house of Nuvelle back to glory!”

She scurried over to grab the candle holder she had been using before, and she gently placed it on the dusty table beside her book. She would never resort to illegal, prohibited uses of magical power like some of the inhabitants of Abyss, but she was not above using highly refined and advanced techniques that had been lost to time. The Shadow Library carried many books that detailed the elemental magic of old, back in the days when the five great dragons still roamed Fodlan and enthusiastically shared their methods with humankind. These were the secrets that the Crystal Knights had cast away, had scorned, had tried to hide from the rest of society. Why had the Guardian of Light been so adamant about concealing the knowledge therein from the rest of the land?

In her eyes, the content of these books was juicier than any gossip that crept around Abyss, which was a bold proclamation, because in a world of social undesirables, the hushed murmurs that flitted about could be rather entertaining indeed.

“I will restore my house,” the young woman whispered, her lapis-colored eyes roaring to life like irises in bloom. “I will restore my honor.” She flung the cover of the book open and slammed it down on the wooden table, causing it to creak in protest.

Of course, when your house--no, your entire kingdom-- was under the domain of the Fire Empire, resisting the Fire Emperor as an Earth elemental was far easier said than done. That was the reason why she had sought out the perfect book on ancient earth techniques, though. Allegedly, the earth elementals of old could not only manipulate plants and soil, but the bedrock of the planet itself. If she could harness her full power and reach into firm, solid, rocky earth….

“I will reclaim my birthright, or my name is not Constance von Nuvelle!” Another hearty laugh left her pursed lips, and her proud “ohohohos” echoed throughout the chamber of the main library.

“Nuvelle?”

A thundering thump resounded throughout the Shadow Library, overtaking even Constance’s lusty laughter. All of the torches that lined the walls of the library roared to life at once, and a brisk breeze blew through the center of the room, scattering loose paper and flippantly flipping the pages of Constance’s book from start to finish.

Indignantly, the Abyss resident thrust her palms down onto the table and jumped up to her feet. The sudden motion made the table sway under her weight and force, but thankfully it managed to stay intact. Who would  _ dare  _ question her name? Who would  _ dare  _ barge into a library so dramatically, where other people were trying to study? Who would  _ dare  _ \--

The grit and determination in Constance’s eyes slowly gave way to horror as she adjusted to the light and absorbed the full image of the intruder.

Vibrant, violet eyes. Pure, porcelain skin. Radiant, red riding gear. Petite, powerful build.

The pearly, powdery hair was a mystery, but the rest of the details were painfully familiar, and when the crimson-clad woman turned around to speak to her companion, another young woman with cerulean hair and black riding gear, the emblem on the back of her outfit confirmed Constance’s suspicions.

Edelgard von Hresvelg, the Fire Princess, had appeared in the flesh to crush Constance’s hopes and dreams underneath her leather heels.

“Trust me,” Edelgard whispered to the other woman. Her voice was hardly audible, but living in Abyss tended to sharpen one’s senses-- survival of the fittest was the way of life down here.

“I do,” the woman murmured back. Her expression was eerily blank and neutral, but the intense storm brewing behind her blue eyes revealed just how intense her emotions were.

“Nuvelle,” Edelgard repeated, turning to face Constance once again. “I have not heard that name since I was a young girl.” She took a step forward. A cautious, calculated step, but the stern stomp of her boots erased any doubt that even in this new, unfamiliar territory-- Constance’s territory-- she would see her mission through to the end.

Whatever that mission may be.

“Constance von Nuvelle,” Constance replied loudly. “That is my name, and it is one that I will always wear with pride!” Could the booming quality of her voice drown out the shivers and shakes that she felt rumbling deep inside her chest? “Now, pray tell, what are you doing here in the deep, dark dregs of society, Your Highness?”

A smirk crawled onto Edelgard’s lips. “So you do recognize me,” she murmured coolly. “Believe me, traveling around the Badlands--” As if she could sense her companion beginning to pout, she stopped mid-sentence and corrected herself. “Desert Lands,” she went on, “for weeks was not how I planned to spend my precious time, but…” She flicked her ponytail behind her shoulder. “Life tends to take us all to unexpected places every now and then. Wouldn’t you agree, Constance?”

So casual! Constance clenched her teeth, but she struggled to keep a courteous smile on her face. “Oh, believe me, I am well aware of the whimsies of fate!” she assured the princess. She pressed down harder on the table, trying to ground herself to fight back the frustration that had sprouted in the pit of her stomach and was growing rapidly.

“Fate?” Edelgard echoed. She tapped her chin thoughtfully. “I prefer not to subject myself to something so… unpredictable.” She took another step forward, and the other woman stayed directly behind her, her eyes flickering around the library as though she were keeping watch. “I should have pieced together the puzzle from the start, but I can reprimand myself for that later. Time is of the essence, after all.”

“You wandered for weeks, you say? I imagine that a princess would have far more important matters to which to attend.” Her fingertips began to curl inward, and her nails started to dig into the loose splinters of the desk beneath her. “Please correct me if I am wrong, Your Highness, but was your hair not formerly a darker color?”

The candle in front of her immediately died, while the rest of the torches in the room began to blaze brighter. Edelgard stopped in her tracks and glowered at her, and the fire in her eyes was even more radiant than the flames she had lit throughout the room. At first glance, she simply looked furious, but upon closer inspection, the scarlet in her cheeks that matched the shade of her outfit gave away her… embarrassment? “I will be the one asking the questions,” she asserted, her tone dangerously low and her words threateningly slow. Deliberate. Tactful.

And horrifying.

Constance could cut the tension in the room with a knife, so she immediately acted to try to lighten the atmosphere. “Well, you have found the Shadow Library, Your Highness,” she announced. “Pull up a chair and stay a while! We have the finest selection of literature across the entirety of Fodlan! Meaning no disrespect to your library, of course,” she added quickly, blushing slightly. A brief flicker of a memory flashed through her mind, a memory of a girl with short blonde curls standing on tiptoe trying to reach the highest shelves of the Imperial Library to fetch all of the fascinating finds that she had discovered there. Constance shook her head rapidly from side to side, clearing that scene from her mind like dust from a shelf. She had no time to reminisce.

“Alas, as much as I would love to stay and explore, I’m afraid that we need to get going.” Edelgard nodded at the blue-haired woman, who took a step forward to stand directly beside her. “As you said, a princess has far more important matters to handle.” A menacingly light roared inside her eyes. “You would know that very well, would you not, Princess Constance?”

Silence fell upon the library. One of the legs of the table gave out underneath Constance’s pressure, and a sharp snap reverberated throughout the otherwise still air. At once, Constance lifted her hands and snapped, and two vines began to sprout from the dead wood of the splintered leg and wrap around the shattered pieces, pulling them in tightly and tying them together once more. An imperfect solution, but it would have to do for now. The vines wound tightly around the two halves of the leg, and they cascaded up and down the length of the leg until that entire portion of the table was a lush green. Constance snapped again, and soft periwinkle flowers began to bud and bloom along the vine. “I guess there’s no point in hiding the truth,” she murmured as she knelt down to admire her handiwork. She gingerly stroked the plants with her soft touch, and they began to glow an even more verdant shade.

Constance rose to her feet again, and she stomped forward so that the heels of her own worn boots clacked against the wooden floor of the library. “My name is Constance von Nuvelle.” With each step she took, a flower began to bloom between the cracks of the wood where her soles had once been. “Heir to the house of Nuvelle.” Red, orange, yellow. Flowers of every color of the rainbow followed her footsteps. “I am an earth elemental.” With each and every step, she began to close the distance between herself and the Fire Princess. “My birthday is March 20, one day following the spring equinox.” Finally, face to face with Edelgard, Constance stopped in her tracks. She folded her arms across the maroon bodice of her dress. “I am the Earth Princess, and one day, I  _ will  _ have the Earth Nation back!”

Silence again.

The air in the room was so thick and heavy that it was stifling. Edelgard seemed to be mulling over her thoughts, carefully preparing her response to this sudden proclamation. Would she burn Constance to a crisp, then and there? Would she accept Constance as another princess? Would she order her accomplice to dispose of Constance and the evidence? Who was that stone-faced woman, anyway? Her riding gear, although black as night as opposed to Edelgard’s fiery red, also bore the emblem of the Fire Empire. Was she one of the Imperial Guard, or perhaps a private assassin?

“Those flowers are beautiful,” Edelgard remarked at last.

The simple utterance was enough to stoke Constance’s fire once again.

“Ohohoho!” An uproarious cacophony erupted from the Earth Princess. She planted her hands on her hips and leaned back, allowing her laughter to spring forth from deep in her abdomen. “Yes, quite impressive, are they not?” she prompted, hungering for more praise. “The handiwork of House Nuvelle is a sight to behold!” She puffed out her chest and continued with her speech, seeing that she had enraptured the attention of both young women before her. “House Nuvelle is not merely full of renowned scholars; we are also practitioners of our craft! We are studious to a fault, but our application of our knowledge is even more spectacular!” She spun on her heel and extended her arms outward, gesturing towards the path of greenery and flora she had left behind. “Yes, yes, these are…” As she examined the path she had left in her wake, however, she could feel the laughter slowly beginning to dissipate and her spirit starting to falter. “... not as big and bright as I had intended them to be,” she muttered.

“They look nice to me,” the blue-haired woman stated. Given her monotone voice, Constance could not be certain if her compliment was genuine, or if she was simply trying to ridicule the blonde.

“I agree.” The soft clack of a heel sounded as Edelgard took a step forward. Constance turned to look back at the Fire Princess, and she could feel her face growing hotter as she saw that the shorter woman was nearly pressed up against her, staring at her with burning intensity. Was this heat radiating off of Edelgard, or was it a product of Constance’s own conscience? “But would it suffice to say that lately, your powers are growing weaker as well?”

“W-w-weaker?!” Constance spluttered, and she took a long stride backward, increasing the distance between herself and the other princess once more. “Why, House Nuvelle never shows weakness! That is to say, although I may not have my rightful title, that does not mean that--”

Edelgard rolled her eyes. “Constance,” she interrupted. “You’re not alone.”

Come to think of it, Edelgard had said the words “as well.” Constance raised an eyebrow and folded her arms across her chest again. “I… would be willing to concede that ever since my birthday, my elemental capabilities have been showing a… slow but steady decline.” She began to twirl a long blonde curl around her finger. Her birthday had been the peak of her power, but ever since then, her spells had taken a little longer to cast and her vegetation was less verdant. She simply thought that she had been overexerting herself from many sleepless nights of studying and practicing, but judging from Edelgard’s tone--no, Edelgard’s mere presence here in the Desert Lands-- a greater problem was afoot. Self-consciously, Constance began to fiddle with the emerald adorning the gold chain on her wrist.

“A house thought to be vanished and a kingdom thought to be vanquished,” the Fire Princess muttered under her breath; barely audible, but once again perceptible by Constance’s trained Abyssian ears. “Listen. We don’t have much time to explain, but we need your help.”

“Your Highness needs my help?” Constance echoed, absolutely floored. Her lips turned upward in a smile. “While I am certainly more than capable, pray tell, what benefits could I derive from--”

“I can restore you to the throne.”

Had she not been so prim, proper, and poised, Constance’s jaw probably would have dropped all the way to the dusty floor. “You’re bluffing.”

Edelgard narrowed her eyes and planted her hands on her hips. “Would I lie in this situation?” she demanded. “Use your head. Two princesses just showed up in the middle of an underground library, specifically seeking you out. Do you think we just dropped by for a spot of tea and a quick chat?” Constance tried to detect mockery in her tone, but she just sensed impatience. Impatience and maybe a hint of… desperation.

Something that Edelgard said struck her as particularly peculiar, though. “Two princesses,” she echoed. “Now, I have not been keeping up with the affairs of the surface, but I firmly believed that Prince Dimitri still was the heir to the Water Kingdom.”

“He is,” Edelgard affirmed. “You are not mistaken. This here,” she tilted her head to the silent blue-haired woman beside her, “is my teacher, my friend, and my ally, the Wind Princess Byleth.”

Wind. Princess.

“Wind?!” Constance exclaimed incredulously. “Nobody has seen a wind elemental since before we were born!” she protested. “Surely she is an earth elemental skillful at using sand, or a water elemental who can control humid air, or--”

Byleth raised her finger to her lips, signaling to Constance that she should silence herself. “I didn’t believe it either, if that’s any consolation,” she told her. “I hear the wind, though. It talks to me. It tells me where it is going, and it listens if I tell it to go somewhere else.” She extended her arm and moved her finger from her lips until it was directly in front of her body. Swiftly and fluidly, she drew a single circle in midair.

A single circle that sent Constance’s hair flying above her head and threw her skirts up in her face.

“I believe you! I believe you!” Constance screeched, and the wind stopped as suddenly as it had started. She flattened down her dress and began to comb through her hair with her fingers, trying to smooth her soft sandy strands. “Well, the two of you seem to be a pretty powerful pair,” she commented as she readjusted her hairband so that it would hold her bangs back. “While I am flattered by your proposition, and I would do anything to see my house restored to glory… why do you need me?” The whole ordeal was beyond suspicious. These two princesses, two of the most powerful elementals in all of Fodlan, had deliberately sought out the princess of a forgotten kingdom, a nation that had been usurped and suppressed by a greedy empire. If the Fire Princess did not need the Earth Nation, why did she suddenly need its princess?

Edelgard dipped her head towards Byleth, who stepped forward and cleared her throat. “The Guardian of Light is going to try forbidden magic,” she began. “In order to do so, she’s draining the powers of the crystals.”

“That’s why my powers are growing weaker,” Constance breathed. She gently traced the outline of her emerald that dangled from her wrist. “The crystals are the source of our power. Our stones merely connect us to them and allow us to channel that power.”

Byleth nodded curtly. “She needs to use all of the elements for her plan,” she continued, “so we need the power of all of the elements to stop her.”

“Which is why you need the royals,” Constance finished. “Why would Lady Rhea scheme in this manner, though? She has always been a pious, pure-- are you  _ laughing _ , Your Highness?” She clenched her hands into fists as she saw Edelgard’s chest begin to rumble and shake with suppressed giggles.

“Most certainly not,” Edelgard insisted to her, although the sparks in her eyes betrayed her words. “Apparently, Lady Rhea is not all that she seems to be,” was all she said in explanation. “We can explain the rest of the details on the way to the water capital, but rest assured.” Her gloved hand reached up to stroke the smooth surface of her ruby necklace, and then she extended that same hand out in front of her towards Constance. “I see now the importance of maintaining all four kingdoms. If--no, when--we stop  _ Lady Rhea _ ,” she hissed the name scornfully, “we will give the Earth villages their princess once again, and House Nuvelle will sit at the top of that restored nation.”

Constance narrowed her eyes skeptically as she scrutinized Edelgar’s outstretched hand. “You would do that?” she murmured. “You  _ could  _ do that?”

“I swear by my ruby that it will be done.” The Fire Princess wiggled her fingers, stretching them even further towards Constance. “But we only have until July, and it is already May. Please, Your Highness.

“All you have to do is reach for my hand.”

* * *

“Next stop, the water capital of Fhirdiad,” Edelgard declared as she ascended the last steps of the staircase leading out of Abyss. “Ah, how grateful I am to be out in the open air once again!” She then rounded a corner and disappeared, and Byleth trekked along after her.

Somehow, Constance had forgotten that going to the Crystal Citadel would require her to reach the surface. “Please let it be nighttime,” she prayed silently. “Please, please…”

Squinting against the harsh sunlight, Constance cursed under her breath as she saw that her prayers had not been answered. Of course they hadn’t. What higher being would bother to waste their time dawdling over  _ her _ ? She was a nobody, a nuisance, a nameless--

“Constance? Constance? Your Highness?” Edelgard called out to her from mere feet away, but she seemed to be miles in the distance. Edelgard was glorious, gallant, and glamorous, while Constance was just--

A hand suddenly waved back and forth in front of her face in a blur. Constance stepped back and blinked rapidly, trying to adjust to the harsh rays of the sun as well as the shape flying before her. “Are you okay?” Byleth asked, and Constance finally became able to discern the older woman’s ashen face inches away from her own.

“I am…” Constance began to mutter a response, but candidly, she was uncertain of how to reply. She was not okay, nor would she ever be okay. She would never be adequate or acceptable, only ever a mediocre meddler who would drag any operation down. “Not worthy of your concern,” she finished solemnly. “Please carry on without me. It was a mistake for me to attempt to accompany you.”

Edelgard had been carrying on ahead, but Constance’s words must have dragged her back. “Please, carry on,” Constance insisted once again. “I--”

“What happened to the haughty, prideful, confident, and borderline obnoxious Constance von Nuvelle?” Edelgard demanded, and she scowled as she looked the meek woman before her up and down. “This is an empty shell. What…” Realization dawned upon her. “Byleth,” she murmured, turning to the wind princess with a sorrowful expression on her face. “We need to get a caravan. She has spent so much time in Abyss that… well…”

Were they trying to accommodate her? Constance lost track of the princesses’ conversation as new voices whispered sharply in her ears, drowning them out.  _ Worthless. Hopeless. Miserable. _ “I shall return at once,” she mumbled, and she began to shuffle around to face the secret staircase leading to Abyss once again. “I wish you the best of luck on--”

“No, no.” Edelgard snapped, and she reached out to firmly grab Constance’s upper arm. Another vice gripped around Constance’s other arm, and she feebly lifted her head to see Byleth standing there, her calloused hands wrapped firmly around Constance’s bicep. “This is going to be a long trip,” Edelgard sighed. “Alright. To Fhirdiad we go.”

* * *

Fhirdiad was currently not an inviting place for fire or wind elementals.

“I will have her head, Father! I swear it!”

Dimitri slammed his fist against the desk in the corner of his room. Quills and ink bottles clattered, and pieces of parchment scattered, from the force of his blow. He looked up at the mirror hanging above his desk. The sight that awaited him, however, was not one that he wanted to see.

His father. His stepmother. His friend Glenn. Countless other guards, soldiers, Duscurians, and familiar faces crowded out his mirror, closing in on him with spine-chilling whispers and desperate demands.

“Let us rest. Let us pass. Let us suffer no more.”

“I will!” Dimitri roared, and he raised his fists up to his face, clawing at his matted blond hair that clung to his face with sticky sweat. “I will free you, so that you no longer must wander the Water Kingdom full of regrets! I will let you rest in peace!” He turned his sizzling cyan gaze onto the mirror again, and with a furious roar, he smashed his fist into its surface, shattering it into pieces.

“I will take the life of the monster who took yours.”


	11. Chapter 10: Whirlpool

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Recruiting the Water Prince turns out to be more of a challenge than Edelgard anticipated.

A harsh yowl. A soft whimper.

Many, many fallen bandages.

“P-please hold still, Your Highness.” A young woman with powder-blue hair sat beside a brooding blond man on the edge of his bed. A small bedside table was pulled up in front of them, and various medical items decorated its surface: towels, bandages, salves, creams.

“This is a waste of time!” the prince barked, and he cried out in pain once again as the woman dabbed at his hand with a towel. “Marianne, you--”

“Please. I am almost finished,” Marianne insisted, quietly but firmly. “I am only here to help you, Your Highness. You…” She trailed off uncomfortably, and her shoulders hunched downward as she began to fold in on herself. “You need your full strength if you are to achieve your goals.”

The prince pondered her words for a moment, then with a gruff shake of his head, he muttered, “Very well. Get on with it.” Quickly he added onto that remark, “But make it fast!”

Marianne nodded rapidly, her eyes wide with trepidation. A whole swarm of emotions beyond that swam in those murky, tea-colored depths, however: apprehension, anxiety, and perhaps even a smidge of… affection? Dimitri had given up on trying to decipher the feelings of others; his only goal was to avenge the fallen, not to appease the living. Something about Marianne, though, was captivating in the way she expressed her emotions. She was subdued and subtle, but behind the waterfall that screened her emotions, she concealed the intensity and passion of a hurricane.

They were alike in that respect.

A soft, cool stream of water began to dance around Dimitri’s knuckles, and its clear surface soon became stained with streaks of scarlet as the water pressed against his bloody, battered skin. “Most of these are finally beginning to scab over,” Marianne observed as she dropped the red stream into an empty bowl. “Unfortunately, some of the deeper cuts are still bleeding.” She furrowed her brow as she began to wave her hands in circles, forming a small ball of water between her palms. “If you don’t mind, could you place your hands inside of this?” she inquired delicately.

Dimitri, despite himself, obliged. He shoved his injured hand into the floating orb, expecting the water to fall apart and splash all over him, but Marianne’s control was exquisite; she simply molded the water around the shape of his body. The water was cool and refreshing, and his hand almost felt… sturdy and calm. Was this the power of her healing magic, or did the diffident young woman before him just carry a soothing aura about her?

The prince hardly had time to consider which option was more plausible as a shooting pain raced through his fingers. He threw back his head and screeched as tendrils of water crept deep into his open wounds, snaking around and pressing further and further into his flesh.

Marianne was staring intently at the ball of water, and her fingers danced and swayed as though she were controlling marionettes, moving her marine puppets around Dimitri’s wounded, open, vulnerable hand.

He hated being wounded, open, and vulnerable.

The blond curled his lips back in a snarl, and he pressed forward to bare his teeth directly in Marianne’s face. The healer’s eyes widened in surprise, and for a split second the spouts of water stopped maneuvering inside of his flesh. Marianne’s gaze fluttered to the floor for a second, but then she lifted it to stare directly back into Dimitri’s good eye. The ferocity swirling behind those wild walnut whirlpools would have made any sane man tremble.

Dimitri, conversely, met her gaze with his own steely, stern blue one. “What in the name of the Guardian of Light are you doing to me?” he growled, his nose twitching as he pulled his lips back farther to reveal his glistening white canines.

“Helping you,” Marianne retorted. Her voice was trembling and her hands were shaking, but the ball of water around Dimitri’s injuries remained solid. “I need to cleanse you.”

Dimitri threw back his head in uproarious laughter. “Cleanse me?” he echoed. “You can clear my wounds, but there is nothing left of the prince you knew. He is as dead as King Lambert,” he hissed. “I have no soul to cleanse, to save.”

“Your Highness…” Marianne began, but Dimitri cut her off with another chortle.

“I am no prince!” he roared. “I am but a slave to those who have passed. I am their vessel. I am their salvation. I have no will. Cleanse my skin, if you must, but know that my hands remain stained in blood no matter what healing waters you may attempt to employ.”

Marianne’s eyes finally fell to the floor once again, and she pulled her hands back. Slowly, the slithering streams of water pulled away from Dimitri, crested with crimson. The bloody ball of water gently landed into the bowl with the other used-up water, also marred with maroon from all of the time that Marianne had spent tending to his wounds. “Wrap your fist tightly with bandages,” she mumbled as she rose to her feet. “Or else I will be forced to come back and tend to you again.” Her tone was full of sorrow, of pity, of longing. “And clearly you do not want that.”

“Wait.” Dimitri stood up beside her, and with his good arm he reached out and clutched his thick hand around Marianne’s slender wrist. With a sigh, the healer turned back and glanced up at him. He towered over her at his full height, so she had to tilt her head back in order to face him directly. “I want you to wrap my bandages.”

A sprinkle of salmon splattered her cheeks. “You do?” she breathed, and she edged a little closer to him.

“That is your task, not mine,” he gruffed. “I need to conserve my energy for what really matters. Besides…” He paused, and he could feel a rush of red rising to his own face. Surely that was just some component of his rage; after all, wasting his time with trivial matters tended to ignite his temper. “I would waste time. You have far more practice.”

The blue-haired young woman allowed her gaze to fall once more and drift over to the table of healing supplies. “Yes, I suppose that is the case,” she murmured mournfully. “Please, take a seat.”

Dimitri nodded briskly and released Marianne from his grasp. He plopped down onto the bed again and extended his arm out to the healer. “Make it quick.”

Marianne picked up a small jar of cream and began to rub it into Dimitri’s skin. “This will help prevent infection,” she explained as she massaged the soothing, cooling ointment into his knuckles and the back of his hand. Her eyes began to wander, however, and Dimitri snarled at her as he saw her attention drifting away.

“I said to make it quick,” he reminded her coldly. “Look at my hand, not at…” He turned his head, trying to follow her gaze. He found himself looking at the empty space on the wall where his mirror used to be. “Not at nothing. There’s nothing there,” he grumbled. His eye flickered sharply back towards Marianne, who thankfully had redirected her gaze back to his injury. Her lips parted for a moment, but if she spoke, he couldn’t distinguish any words from her light, breathy voice. “I didn’t like what I saw.”

“Hmm?” Marianne blinked and shot a quick glance at him.

“I didn’t like what I saw in the mirror,” Dimitri barked. “Don’t make me say it again.”

Marianne nodded in understanding and finished rubbing the salve into his hand. She gently placed the jar back on the table and picked up a roll of bandages. “I… know how that feels,” she whispered, her faint voice barely audible.

Dimitri scoffed and opened his mouth to deliver a stinging retort. How could she know what it felt like to be haunted? How could she know what it felt like to look into a mirror and see a beast staring back? How could she know what it felt like to be enveloped by shadows even when the surrounding room shone with daylight?

“Y-Your Highness?” A sharp knock rapped at his door, and Dimitri whipped his head around to glare fiercely at the entrance to his quarters.

“What do you want?” the prince demanded, feeling his ire rising up in his throat like bile. “I do not want any senseless interruptions!”

“I… yes… I understand,” the guard outside the door stammered. “It’s just… you have a visitor, from the Fire Empire.”

The blond shook Marianne off and rose to his feet so that he could stalk over to the door. He flung it wide open with such force that he nearly ripped it from its hinges. Beneath him, a guard stood as straight and tall as she could muster, but her stance faltered as soon as the imposing presence of the prince appeared directly before her. “At this hour?” More importantly, from the Fire Empire? “Impossible,” he muttered. “I put an embargo on trade with the foul Empire.”

The guard began to fiddle with her chestplate. “Yes, Your Highness, but…”

“But what?” Dimitri demanded, and he slammed his fist into the wall beside him. A soft crumbling began to rumble in the doorframe, and a stinging pain shot through his skin. He grumbled under his breath, and as he pulled his hand back to shake off the ache, the guard’s eyes flew wide open in terror upon seeing the cracks and dent in the wall that the prince had left behind.

“This is not a merchant,” the guard squeaked. “Her Highness, the Fire Princess herself, seeks an audience with you.”

The Fire Princess. Edelgard von Hresvelg.

The bane of his miserable existence.

For the first time in weeks, maybe even months, Dimitri felt a genuine smile creeping up onto his face. “Call Dedue,” he ordered. “And take that witch out back to meet me in the gardens.”

“Dimitri-” Marianne began, and he could hear her skirts rustle and shuffle as she got onto her feet and began to walk up behind him.

“Stop right there,” he demanded, his voice harsh like the splattering of rain on stone. “You will wait here until I am finished.”

“But I--”

“You will wait here,” Dimitri repeated, and he folded his arms over his broad chest as he glowered at her. “I will have many new wounds by the time I am finished… dealing with our visitor,” he murmured. Boiling up inside of him came a low, harsh laugh, and slowly he allowed it to bubble out of his chest and into the eerily silent room. “If you insist on being my healer, then I will use you until the skin falls from your bones.”

Before waiting for any reply, Dimitri slammed his door behind him, leaving Marianne in his wake as he stalked off towards the gardens. For years now, he had been trying to ascend a wave, but he had been stuck at its base, floundering in the open sea.

Now, finally, he was nearing the crest, and he was ready to bring it crashing down.

* * *

Clouds shrouded the night sky above the castle gardens, casting thick shadows along the cobblestone pathways. Fhirdiad was infamous for its brutal, chilling winters, but now that it was the end of May, the weather was more conducive to helping the flora flourish.

Nevertheless, with only a half-moon providing light amidst a murky sea of swallowed stars, even the vibrant flowers of Dedue’s carefully kept garden hardly provided any solace in their dark surroundings.

Dimitri had been stalking along towards the pool in the center of the garden with brisk, taut strides. He moved almost mechanically, swinging one leg in front of the other as he trudged forth. His mission was almost at an end. His goal was in sight. How could he not press forth? The prince balled his hands into fists and slowly uncurled his fingers, then repeated the motion. He half-expected his bandages to come loose, but Marianne had done a fine job of winding them tightly around his torn-up tissue and scarred skin.

Finally the pond came into Dimitri’s one-eyed view, and much to his simultaneous delight and dismay, so did a young woman with ghost-white skin and bone-white hair. Remnants of the lives she had stolen, without a doubt. If they must haunt his mind internally, then they must curse her appearance externally.

He must have become tenser than he realized upon spotting her, because a sudden weight dropped down onto his shoulder. A warm, comforting touch in the midst of the surprisingly crisp spring night. Dimitri turned his head to glance at the large, firm, but supportive mocha-colored hand on his shoulder. Warm and comforting like the hot chocolate he used to enjoy as a child after playing in the Water Kingdom’s snowy hills with his beloved, beautiful, brazen stepsister.

Hot chocolate he could never taste again and peaceful days he could never partake in again, all thanks to that monster.

“Be cautious, milord,” was all that Dedue murmured, his breath cool and breezy against Dimitri’s ear. “Remember that I am here should you need me.”

Dimitri raised his good hand up to gingerly place it atop Dedue’s. For a split second, he almost felt as though he could rest, as though he could maybe just talk to Edelgard, as though he could simply ask her for the truth and put his mind at peace.

But as he looked back to the woman in question, screams immediately overtook Dedue’s soft voice, storming around inside his head like a monsoon pummeling the coast.  _ “Save us! Free us! Avenge us!” _

Dimitri smacked Dedue’s hand away and strode forward once again, his chest puffed out and his chin held high.

“There you are, Dimitri,” Edelgard called out to him. She raised her hand to wave him forward. As though she had any power to command him or direct his steps, while she had the audacity to be standing in the middle of  _ his  _ garden at  _ his  _ castle in  _ his  _ territory among the souls of  _ his  _ loved ones. Out of the corner of his eye, he believed he spotted two other young women, one with hair the color of the night sky and one with blonde curls the color of sunflowers. He didn’t need to concern himself with them, though. Edelgard was his goal. “We don’t have much time to explain, so I’m going to need you to--”

“Silence!” Dimitri snarled. His outburst must have caught Edelgard off guard, because her eyes grew wide and her eyebrows raised high in surprise. Nevertheless she obliged, planting her hands on the hips of her red riding gear with a slight pout protruding from her lip. “In Fhirdiad, I am the sole ruler,” he sneered. “I will make the requests.”

Edelgard took a threatening step forward. “You don’t have to act all tough around me,” she snapped back. “I’m sure Dedue knows the truth, and I believe that Byleth and Constance deserve to know it as well.” She flipped her ponytail behind her shoulders and then pointed a finger directly at Dimitri’s chest. “You can let your guard down alone out here with just this group… little brother.”

The blonde woman gasped, while the blue-haired woman looked unperturbed by the revelation. Just as Edelgard had suspected, Dedue already knew about the connection between the two royals, but that did not stop the larger young man from tensing up beside him. Dimitri took a step forward, and the water in the pond began to bubble. With each step, the water began to swirl and sway more and more, and the bubbling increased fervently and feverishly. Finally he stopped once his silver chestplate could press against Edelgard’s outstretched finger.

“I have no sister,” he murmured at last, his voice as icy as a blizzard. “She died nine years ago in the Tragedy of Duscur. The Tragedy that she orchestrated with her own malicious, malevolent hands.”

The surprise in her expression increased tenfold. “What in the--”

He didn’t let her finish her sentence. A mighty wave reared up like a stallion from the pond, and it cast its shadow over the three young women in the garden as it prepared to swallow them all whole.

“Edelgard!” The woman in black riding gear jumped in front of the Fire Princess, trying to shield her with her body. Dimitri finally recognized her as the mercenary that he had spotted wandering around the Imperial Palace on his last visit. So Edelgard had recruited her into her battalion of brutes. No matter; he had no quarrel with her, so long as she did not obstruct his path.

That is, he had no issue with her until she thrust her palms outward and sent forth a gust that effectively blew the water in the opposite direction and back into the pond.

‘Another wind elemental?’

Dimitri felt his whole understanding of the world begin to tremble and shake, cracking outward from the core.

Or was that his body, shivering with the cruel laugh that was rising up inside of him as he felt something in his mind snap?

“Is this some kind of twisted joke?” he shouted, and he ground his teeth together as he bared them at Edelgard and her entourage. “No… it was you, Edelgard! You fiend!”

Edelgard, in turn, was simmering with fury. “What in Fodlan are you going on about?” she demanded. “The Tragedy of Duscur? Dimitri, I was fourteen years old when that happened. More importantly, I was in the Empire when that happened!”

Dimitri scoffed and repeated in a mocking tone, “ _ I was fourteen years old _ ! You’ve always been a prodigy, for better or for worse. You can no longer keep your secrets from me! Lady Rhea told me everything!” Without taking his eye off of her, he extended his arm out towards Dedue, who stood diligently by his side. “Dedue, I need you,” he murmured, and this simple order was enough for his trusted companion to know what to do.

At once, Dedue raised his hand to the sky, and a crystal-clear icicle manifested in his palm. One, then two. Then three. A triad of fine-pointed icicles, each one aimed at one of the young women before them.

“I should have realized it the day you returned with your hair as white as an opal,” Dimitri mused sorrowfully, and he closed his eyes. “I was a fool to have trusted you for all of this time. But no matter.” His eyes flung wide open again, one foggy like mist on a lake, the other as clear as morning dew, but both colder than the ice storm that had ruined his life nine years ago. “I will hang your head from the gates of Enbarr, Edelgard von Hresvelg!”

He snapped, and Dedue’s perfectly poised icicles shot forward for each girl’s heart.

As powerful as Dedue’s magic was, Edelgard had the advantage of speed. She swung her arm in front of her as though she were swatting a fly, and a streak of fire erupted from her fingertips, catching the points of the icicles and sending the half-melted missiles careening into the ground. “I do not wish to fight you!” she insisted. “Listen to me, Dimitri!”

“I have spent nine years listening to your lies!” Dimitri growled, and he carefully curled his fingers into his palms to form two furious, firm fists. “No longer!” He punched the air, and fist-shaped volleys of water charged directly at Edelgard. “Never again!”

Edelgard groaned loudly and dropped to the ground in order to roll out of the way. Swiftly she sprang back to her feet. “What did Rhea tell you to make you act this way?” she demanded.

Every word she spoke made his blood boil hotter and hotter. Could she not see that her charade was over and that the curtain had fallen on her act? “I should have known it from the moment you returned with your hair as white as opals!” he hissed. “I was blinded by my love, like a fool!”

For the first time that night, the Fire Princess looked truly taken aback. “Opals…” she whispered. “What did Rhea tell you?” she cried once again. “Dimitri, I deserve to know!”

“You deserve nothing but death!” Dimitri howled. He slammed his hands onto the ground, and the water from the pond rose up again in another massive wave. He would knock her down and drag her into the depths before she ever had a chance to blow it away. “You may be able to bully others into submission with your flames, but not me.” He smirked as he raised his hands up to the sky. “I am going to send you to the eternal flames where you belong, Fire Princess!”

“Enough!” The blonde woman--the only one who Dimitri did not recognize--angrily stomped her boots into the earth. At once, the bushes, tendrils, and vines of the garden began to rise, and they wove together to form a huge wall of vegetation that blocked Dimitri’s wave. “Prince Dimitri, you are acting like an irrational boor!”

“A boar? So be it. I’ve been called worse,” Dimitri snarled. 

She threw up her hands in exasperation. “A boor!” she repeated. “B-o-o-r! Oh, no matter! We are trying to have a civilized conversation, princesses to prince, and you are throwing an absolute temper tantrum! Your behavior is deplorable!”

Dimitri’s gaze flickered from the screeching blonde, to the ghastly Fire Princess whose arms were folded across her chest, to the stone-faced mercenary who looked ready to spring into action at any moment. “Dedue, she’s brainwashed them all,” he murmured mournfully. “We cannot let a single one of them live.”

Dedue, however, looked… uncertain. Thick shadows shrouded his scarred face and stern jaw. “Perhaps we should give them the opportunity to--”

The prince pulled his fists in so tightly that his nails began to dig into his palms. He could feel blood beginning to spill forth from his pierced flesh. “Edelgard is the reason why Duscur is gone! Why my father and  _ our  _ mother no longer live!” He uncurled his hands, and a jet of water erupted from each fingertip towards Edelgard’s ensemble. “You killed your own mother, you monster!”

Edelgard gritted her teeth and unfolded her arms, allowing them to dangle from her sides. “I think I need to smack you around a little before you’ll listen,” she cooed softly. “Byleth. Constance. Lend me a hand. But do not injure him too badly--we need him.”

With one flick of her wrist, Edelgard generated a fireball and sent it hurtling towards Dimitri. The blonde--Constance, presumably--snapped, and one of the vines from the clustered grape plants hereby flung out to slice Dimitri’s water jets into pieces. Byleth, meanwhile, had darted forward, heading directly for Dedue.

The Duscurian man slid his foot along the ground, and a thick wall of ice materialized before him. He carefully clenched it from both sides and held it up before him like a shield.

Byleth continued running, though, and as light and nimble as a feather, she kicked up her feet and floated up and over the shield. She planted one foot on its surface, using it like a springboard to help her flip over to the other side, where Dedue stood, flabbergasted. He spun around with his shield and smacked Byleth squarely in the side, sending the thin woman hurtling across the garden straight for a thick tree.

“Byleth!” Edelgard cried.

“You don’t have time to worry about her!” Dimitri crowed, and he punched at the air again, sending fists of water flying at the Fire Princess.

Constance was on top of the matter already. She traced a pattern in the air before her, and the grasses and bushes of the garden moved to follow her command, catching Byleth in a leafy glove before her skull could crash into the solid bark.

“Thank you,” Byleth wheezed, and she rolled out of the way as a flurry of sharp icicles came hurtling towards her. They pierced the leafy hammock that had saved Byleth, tearing it to shreds and sending scraps of greenery flying about the garden. 

A single tear slid down Dedue’s sinewy cheek as he destroyed the plants that he had nurtured so tenderly. “For His Highness,” he muttered, and he whirled around to throw balls of ice at Constance before preparing another round of icicle ammunition to fire at Byleth.

A sudden whistle and a flash of heat told Dimitri that he could no longer spend time concerning himself with Dedue’s battles, however. He narrowed his eyes as the Fire Princess flung a flickering orb of flame at his face, and he dropped into a low squat before it could set him ablaze.

While he was still getting back to his feet, Edelgard unleashed a warrior’s battle cry that could rival that of a black eagle swooping down to catch its prey. She dashed forward, her feet flying moreso than running as she hurled herself at him. The heel of her boot caught him squarely in the chest, and with a grunt he fell onto his back as Edelgard threw her entire body weight on top of him.

“Listen to me!” Edelgard demanded, and she sat firmly in the center of his sternum. She planted her feet on either side of him, straddling him as she placed one hand on each of his arms, trying to pin them down. He began to writhe and squirm, and he tried to curl his hands inward to fling her off, but as soon as he showed too much resistance, a searing heat coursed through his skin. Dimitri howled with rage as Edelgard lit her hands with flames and the stench of burning flesh wafted to his nose. “Rhea is manipulating you!”

“You’re the manipulative monster here!” Dimitri roared back, and with a grunt he tried to push his chest upward and overwhelm her with sheer strength. She just tightened her grip, though, and increased the level of heat in her hands.

“Your powers are growing weaker!” Edelgard dug her nails into his arms. “Mine are too! All of us are getting weaker, clumsier, and more sluggish with our magic. Rhea would do anything to make sure we are powerless to stop her plot.”

The prince threw back his head and bellowed deeply like a lion about to tear a hyena apart. “Enough, you cursed wind-wielding wench!” He thrust his heels into the ground, and water surged forth from beneath his feet, propelling him out of Edelgard’s grasp. He stopped a few feet away, and slowly he picked himself up onto his knees. Berry-colored blisters adorned his arms, but he had no time to dwell on them. He still had his legs. He jumped up to his feet and pointed the toe of his boot at Edelgard, sending a stream of water across the ground. The Fire Princess was still rising from her sudden smack against the ground, but the snake of water tripped her up before she could rise again.

“Dedue, now!” Dimitri ordered. He prepared for a barrage of icicles to pierce Edelgard’s hands and feet and pin her to the ground, or perhaps a thick blanket of snow to smother her, crushing her ribs and her spine. As long as Dimitri would be the one to take her head, he would be satisfied.

No,  _ they  _ would all be satisfied.

Instead, he was greeted by a tornado that rose up from beneath his feet and sent him flying into the midair. He flailed about as he tried to regain control of his body and find solid ground, but the prince soon found himself on his back once again as another gust of wind suddenly appeared from above and pushed him onto the earth. The blow knocked the wind out of him, and Dimitri coughed up blood as he tried to regain his breath.

“Listen to us, Your Highness.”

That wasn’t Edelgard’s sinister sneer. That was a monotone, flat, level, voice completely devoid of emotion. Devoid of malice. Devoid of hatred. Devoid of anger.

And that was why it was so terrifying.

Byleth walked forward, carefully placing one foot in front of the other. Her lips were purple, her arms were bruised, and her fingertips were nearly as blue as her hair, but somehow, she strode forward with a quiet confidence that radiated off of her in waves. 

Above all, Dimitri could not help but notice the porcelain glow of her skin, which was as white as opal.

“My name is Byleth Eisner,” she began. “Former mercenary, former instructor, and current…” She swallowed hard. “Current Wind Princess.” She finally stood over him, and she placed one foot on top of his throat. “Do not speak. I am speaking.”

Dimitri’s gaze flew around wildly, looking for Dedue for support, but his comrade was tied up in a tree, underneath which Constance stood guard.

“I am the Wind Princess, and I am the last wind elemental.” A flicker of emotion danced across her eyes, but it was too sudden and subtle for him to detect exactly what it was. “I do not know why you are angry with Edelgard,” she went on, “but if you need to hate a wind elemental, I’m the one you should hate.” She moved her boot and knelt down beside him. With a careful, cool touch, she brushed his matted blond bangs out of his face, revealing the jagged scar across his damaged eye. “Your eyes are like the sea,” she observed in a low whisper. “We need you, Prince Dimitri.”

Edelgard had finally come up to join them, and she knelt down on Dimitri’s other side. “Perhaps we can exchange mutually beneficial information,” she offered. She extended her hand out in front of him. “I will tell you everything I know about Lady Rhea’s plan to steal the elements for her own selfish ends,” she began, “and you can tell me everything about Duscur.” She briefly curled her fingers into a fist. “We will find the ones who took our mother away.”

_ Our  _ mother.

Of course. Edelgard was his beloved stepsister. She never could have been guilty of what he had accused. How could he have been so blind? Plus, if Princess Byleth spoke the truth, and she really were the last wind elemental…

He would need to keep his eye on her, undoubtedly, but he could at least trust Edelgard.

Voices began to creep up inside his ear, and Dimitri winced as he braced himself for the agonized screams to fill his head once again, yearning for the revenge that they could never acquire, pleading for closure so that they could rest.

_ “Avenge us,”  _ they whispered.

If he was to do that properly, he would need Edelgard’s aid.

“El,” he murmured. “I… from the bottom of my heart, I am sorry.”

“I know you are,” Edelgard told him, and she chuckled softly as she lightly elbowed his chest. “Now let me help you up. Constance, you can let Dedue down.”

Dimitri reached out and accepted Edelgard’s outstretched hand, and as soon as she pulled him to his feet, he pulled her into his chest for a tight bear hug.

“We will solve this mystery together,” he whispered into her ear, his voice light and cool.

“Obviously.” Her hot breath danced inside his ear, and she smirked as she pulled herself back from the hug.

“Oh, how touching!” Constance cried out as she rejoined them, Dedue rubbing his wrists as he shuffled after her. “Star-crossed siblings reunited underneath the silver moon. Yes, it’s picturesque. But you know what would make it even more beautiful? A bath!” She flicked some twigs out of her long blonde locks. “Dimitri, after the ordeal you put us through, you had better provide some exquisite hospitality!”

Laughing was painful; Dimitri was positive that he had broken a rib or two. Then again, living was painful.

This team, though, could make the journey worthwhile.


	12. Chapter 11: Blaze

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Edelgard needs to tell Byleth the truth.

“Please hold still!”

Edelgard bit her lip as a young woman with sky blue hair gently placed her hands on Edelgard’s ankle. The woman’s touch suddenly became thick with moisture as she cast a thin sheen of water over her hands and pressed it into the Fire Princess’s pant leg. Edelgard tried to avoid water whenever possible--beaches, ponds, pools--but if this was the best method for healing…

She would have to grin and bear it.

“Your skills are truly phenomenal, Marianne,” Edelgard murmured once the healer pulled back. “I never would have imagined that a twisted ankle could heal so quickly.”

Marianne’s face flushed and she tried to wave her hand dismissively. “I… My skills really have room for improvement,” she murmured shyly. “I am honored to be able to help you, though, Your Highness.”

Edelgard lifted her leg and wound her ankle in a full circle, trying to feel for any more sore spots or bruised bits. “I can probably put more weight on this now,” she remarked. “Please do not sell yourself short, Marianne. A boast or two would look beautiful on you.”

“B-b-b…” Deep magenta marbled the young woman’s otherwise pale, mild features. “I will… keep that in mind, Your Highness.”

Edelgard smiled softly as she put her foot back down onto the cot. “You are far more talented a healer than you think. I’m not just referring to your elemental capabilities,” she added quickly, before Marianne could object. “You have the patience of a healer, too.” Now it was Edelgard’s turn to feel flustered. “I know you’re the one who tended to my stepbrother’s wounds during his… his battle.”

Marianne turned away from the princess to pick up a roll of bandages. “Yes, well,” she mumbled, hardly audible as she faced the other direction. “I could empathize. He felt himself to be a beast, and I… Let’s just say that my bloodline…” Her voice began to shake and her words faltered. “I want to use my powers for good,” was all she said at last. “Let me wrap that up carefully, now.” Her voice became light and sing-song again as she changed the subject back to the matter at hand: Edelgard’s health. Edelgard complied silently and extended her foot, but the questions that flooded her mind still remained.

“You know,” Marianne murmured. “Your healing would be faster if I could, um, directly put the water onto your skin, instead of through your clothes.”

That topic again. Edelgard gritted her teeth. “I am aware.” Her words snaked out like a hiss, perhaps a bit too harshly, judging from the way Marianne flinched and shrank away. “I prefer this method, even if it is slower. Thank you, Marianne.”

She did not have time to wait for a response. Edelgard slid her boots back onto her stocking-clad feet, and then hopped up onto her healthy leg. Tentatively, she proceeded to place her injured foot on the ground beside it. “It appears that I can put more weight on it than before. Thank you again. I believe your next patient is here.”

Edelgard blew through the doorway without another word, simply nodding to Dedue as she flew past.

* * *

Sometimes, all a princess needed to calm down was a quiet walk outdoors among beautiful, flourishing gardens.

“Lady Edelgard! Lady Edelgard!”

So much for a  _ quiet  _ walk.

Suppressing a sigh, Edelgard strode over to the source of the voice. The sun was nearly on the horizon, and stars twinkled and glittered overhead. She was not exactly sure of what she expected to find, but Constance von Nuvelle crouched in the dirt beside an empty flowerbed was probably at the bottom of the list.

“You must see the new trick that Lady Byleth and I have devised,” Constance insisted. “Prepare to be… blown away! Oho!” She tapped the ground rhythmically, allowing her fingers to dance across the dirt until a ball of soil began to rise. “Now, Lady Byleth!”

Byleth nodded with determination, and she held her hands up in front of her face and wiggled her fingers, imitating Constance’s own hand motions. Tiny breezes fluttered forth from each fingertip towards the ball of soil. Several of the gales blasted the ball apart into fragments of earth, peat, and dirt, while a couple of others wrapped in a circle overarching the entire display, helping to keep the dirt contained within a certain area.

“Ta-dah!” Constance planted her hands on her hips and nodded with satisfaction at their miniature display. “It’s a sandstorm!” She paused and furrowed her brow. “Well, a soilstorm, but if we had sand, it would be a sandstorm!” Byleth nodded in agreement, continuing to wiggle her fingers like a puppeteer as she helped the soilstorm dance before them. She began to spell out letters with the soil. 

_ Do. You. Like. It. ?. _

“It’s very charming,” Edelgard managed to squeeze out. She was trying to see the practicality of such a technique, or why Constance had felt compelled to draw her attention to it, but she was not about to put out their little blaze of glory. “I just wish it were on a larger scale.”

Constance’s gaze turned downward, and the soil slowly cascaded back down onto the ground as Byleth shoved her hands inside her pockets sheepishly. “As do I,” Constance murmured. “I am sure we could recreate that on a larger scale, with a little more time,” she added quickly, trying to reassure Edelgard of her capabilities. 

Or maybe she was trying to console herself.

“My powers keep getting weaker,” Byleth stated bluntly. “Constance’s, too.”

Edelgard knelt down onto the ground beside them. “That’s peculiar,” she murmured. “Mine, conversely, are… Well, allow me to demonstrate.” She held out her palm, and with a single twitch of her thumb, a large, flickering flame materialized in her hand. She threw it up like a ball, and then caught it as it came spiraling down. Up. Down. Up. Down. The flame continued to roar with the same intensity, not shedding any fiery fragments even as Edelgard tossed it around. Her audience observed with wide, admiring eyes. “For the past couple days, I have noticed my powers regaining their strength.” She had thought the phenomenon to be a fluke, a lucky accident, but the more she practiced, the more she realized she was regaining her old levels of control.

“Today is June third.”

A booming but benevolent baritone sounded behind them. Edelgard leaned her head back and spotted her stepbrother advancing towards them. He cast them a friendly wave before stopping directly behind Edelgard. “El, the summer solstice is in a matter of weeks.”

The summer solstice. Of course. “Fire elementals are strongest on the solstice,” she murmured. “No wonder I have become stronger as we get closer.”

“June third,” Constance echoed. “Why, that only leaves us…” She held up her fingers and began to count under her breath. “Exactly four weeks until July!”

Despite the fact that they were outdoors in the open air, all four royals suddenly felt the weight of the atmosphere crashing in on them, threatening to suffocate them.

Dimitri was the first to speak and break the tension. “The summer solstice is June 20,” he reminded everyone. “That’s before July, and that’s when El will be at her strongest.” He began to run his fingers through her long, stringy white hair. She hadn’t brushed it properly in about two months, so it was becoming frayed and feeble; she was almost embarrassed to feel her stepbrother playing with it so tenderly, but at the same time, she found the sensation soothing. “That is when we will strike.”

Edelgard pondered his bold declaration for a minute, then she nodded slowly in assent. “That gives us another two weeks to heal,” she added. “Some of us still need that time.” Her gaze flickered to the red streaks on Dimitri’s arms; her desperate attempts to restrain him were bound to leave scars, and she felt a pang of guilt at seeing how she had marred her only remaining family.

“Quite frankly, we may even want to consider ourselves lucky that our powers are weakening,” Dimitri offered, trying to lighten the mood. “Otherwise, I do fear that Dedue might have frozen Princess Byleth’s fingers off.”

The air became thick and tense again, and Dimitri coughed self-consciously. “Sorry. That was not the type of matter about which I should jest,” he mumbled.

Apparently the prince, after all of his trials and trauma, had taken to morbid humor as a coping mechanism. What about her, after all of her own struggles to survive?

“We shall heal here for the next two weeks,” Edelgard continued, acting as though Dimitri had never made his off-base remarks. “Then we strike.”

“Will Prime Minister Ferdinand be able to survive without you for so long?” Dimitri whispered to her, a small smirk creeping up on his face.

“Will Marianne be able to survive with you dealing with all of these beautiful women for so long?” Edelgard muttered back, and upon seeing the blush that bespeckled her stepbrother’s cheeks, she knew she had won that argument.

With a small chuckle, Edelgard shrugged her brother’s hands away and rose to her feet. She dusted off her trousers and boots, and then she walked over to Byleth. “I do believe you could use a bath after playing in the dirt,” she commented. She held out her hand, and the Wind Princess accepted her help in pulling her to her feet. “Have a wonderful night, you two,” Edelgard called back to Dimitri and Constance. She strode forward at her brisk pace, not even looking to see if Byleth was keeping up.

The firm grip around her hand reassured her that Byleth was traveling in tow.

* * *

Byleth was speaking. Edelgard was almost certain of that.

“Edelgard? Your Highness? Fire Princess?”

She didn’t have time to stop and listen.

“I’m pretty sure the baths were that way… Edelgard?”

The white-haired woman kept pulling Byleth along, having a clear destination in sight. While the Wind Princess undeniably needed to wash up after her evening making soilstorms with the Earth Princess, Edelgard first needed her all to herself. She couldn’t risk anyone overhearing them: not Constance, not Marianne, not even Dimitri.

She had put off this conversation for far too long already, and if the royals were to be at their full power in their battle against Rhea, then Byleth needed to know all of the tools at her disposal.

Upwards, upwards. Edelgard dragged Byleth up the staircase towards the guest rooms, holding out a small candle-shaped flame to light their path as they trekked along. Byleth had stopped arguing and simply followed along curiously, but judging from the sweat beginning to coat the former mercenary’s palm, Edelgard could determine that she was growing more anxious and more impatient.

Byleth, anxious and impatient? The mercenary she met months ago was as cold and sturdy as a stone sculpture. She had begun to emote more as time went on, but to think that she cared enough to squeeze Edelgard’s hand firmly, to feel nervous, and to trust in Edelgard all the same….

The thought was overwhelming, and so Edelgard pushed it aside.

Finally the pair reached Edelgard’s guest quarters, and Edelgard held her “candle” afloat in front of her to free up her hand and be able to open the bedroom door. “I promise you, we will get you to the baths,” Edelgard assured her. “In case you have forgotten, I visited here often during my adolescence. I made a special request for my own quarters and my own bath.” 

As she led Byleth into her room, the mercenary remained silent, listening attentively. “You may have noticed that I have never joined you and Constance in the main bathhouse.” She wormed her way behind a bookshelf, and she tugged gently on Byleth’s hand, urging her to follow her down a side corridor. “When I bathe I need a little… privacy,” she mumbled, blushing slightly. As Edelgard scurried down the hallway, Byleth in tow, the torches on the side of the walls roared to life without any prompting. Edelgard’s mere (flustered) presence was enough to set them ablaze.

Finally the pair emerged into a wide, but dimly lit, cavern. In the center, a medium-sized stone bath awaited them. “Go ahead and get ready,” Edelgard encouraged her, and she slowly slid her fingers out from Byleth’s grip. “The soaps and towels are over there.” She pointed to a stone shelf in the corner, and as soon as she did, a torch erupted in flame, marking Byleth’s destination clearly with its vibrant light.

As the Fire Princess went to draw water for the bath, a flurry of frenzied thoughts flitted about her mind. Was she making a wise judgment call or a fatal mistake? Would Byleth leave her, leave the team, and thus render them inadequate to face Rhea? Would Byleth scorn her, or would she accept her? Would it be foolish for Edelgard to dream of such a fantastical outcome?

“El.”

The name sent a shiver down Edelgard’s spine. She whirled around to see Byleth, already sitting submerged in the bath from her shoulders down. “That’s what Dimitri calls you, right?” Byleth inquired innocently. “I like it. It’s short and simple.”

Edelgard began to fiddle with her ponytail, carefully undoing the ties that held it up. She could feel the frayed white hair beneath her gloved fingers letting out a gasp of relief to finally be let down, eagerly awaiting the gentle, rhythmic strokes of her hairbrush. She reminded herself to ask Dimitri, or perhaps Marianne, for a brush in the morning.

Assuming she had the gall to remain if this meeting went poorly.

“It’s a name from my childhood,” Edelgard explained cautiously. She took a few steps closer to the edge of the bath, where she could get a closer look at Byleth’s face. “My mother used to call me by that name, as did my siblings.”

“Siblings?” A crease of confusion appeared on Byleth’s forehead. “I don’t remember seeing any other princes or princesses at the Imperial Palace.”

“That’s because I am the only one who remains.”

Even Byleth did not have a response for that. She lowered herself deeper into the bath, allowing the warm water to soak her fully. She kept dipping lower and lower until her head was fully underwater. A couple of bubbles popped up directly above her, and then she burst forth from the water once again. She shook her head, sending water droplets flying from her messy midnight locks. Edelgard recoiled instantly, trying to stay clear of the water until she was absolutely ready to dive in. She was still fully clothed, after all.

“Tell me, Byleth, have you ever seen me without full gear? Have you ever seen my skin besides my face?”

Byleth reached a hand up to tap her chin thoughtfully. “No,” she decided at last. “You even wear gloves and socks at all hours.”

Edelgard began to shuffle backward and kick off one of her leather boots. “Tell me, Byleth, have you ever wondered how I became the most powerful elemental in Fodlan?”

Her teacher pursed her lips, and another frustrated wrinkle popped up on her forehead as she pondered the question. “Because of your birthday?”

Edelgard chuckled softly as she slid her other boot off. “Yes, I suppose that fate is the reason why I started out as a child prodigy,” she murmured. “But the power I have now is the result of something else.”

“Training.” Byleth offered immediately. “Practice.” Her expression softened all of a sudden, and her face smoothed out except for a small crinkle at the edge of her eyes and a dimple above the corner of her lips. “I’ve seen you study, El. You’re an incredible student.”

On any other day, Edelgard probably would have fallen weak at the knees and tried to fervently deny her teacher’s praise. Today, her mind was occupied by too many dark, depressing memories to allow herself such giddiness. “I want to show you something, Byleth.

I want to show you what the most powerful elemental in Fodlan truly looks like.”

She bit at the fingertip of her glove, and with a quick jerk of her neck she pried it off. She did not even need to look at Byleth to be able to detect the sudden heat radiating off of her in waves. Surely, the sight of the pink, scabbed, scarred flesh would embarrass any onlooker. Muffling a sigh, Edelgard moved on to her next glove, prying it off slowly and smoothly with her teeth.

Once her hands were free, she used them to begin to unbutton the neckline of her blouse. The ruffles fell down to her shoulders, and soon the linen of the entire top began to fall down towards the ground and Edelgard slid each button out, one by one. She could feel her hands becoming more unsteady, more uncertain, as she inched down her body to remove all of her protective, concealing garments. Her fingers fumbled around with the button on her pants for quite some time before she finally set it free, and she wrapped her fingers around both the seam of her trousers and the rim of her pantyhose to tug them down the length of her body at the same time.

“This is who I am.”

She did not dare to look down at her own body, instead choosing to focus on Byleth’s expression. The former mercenary was an enigma to read as always, though, which only increased Edelgard’s apprehension. How could she remain so stony and cold even after witnessing this? She knew what she looked like. Criss-crossed with scars of all shapes and sizes. Snakes of red, pink, and brown that slithered across her body from neck to toe. Veinous blemishes that pulsed with every flex of her muscle, every pump of her blood, every breath from her lungs.

She was like a porcelain doll that had shattered into pieces and that a cruel cobbler had tried to slap back together with blood instead of paste.

“Not everyone is happy with the society we live in,” Edelgard mumbled, finding the words tumbling forth from her mouth as though a damn had burst inside her mind and sent a waterfall cascading down. “Some hate the elementals and everything we stand for. Some would do anything to see Lady Rhea and the kingdoms fall… even human experimentation.” Byleth was not even speaking, so why did she feel the need to continue? The words just kept gushing out. “Linhardt was right. The whispers he heard at the Crystal Citadel were true.” She cleared her throat and tried to imitate the librarian’s sleepy, half-interested tone. “‘A group of dastards was actually trying to grind up precious stones and infuse them into the blood of normal humans.’ Except normal humans kept dying, so they had no choice but to use elementals.” She balled her hands into fists. “And my useless father, the proud Fire Emperor, let them take his own children for their deplorable deeds.”

Suddenly she pounded her fist against her chest, and she let out a proclamation of pride. “I am all that remains! I am the only one who made it through! And that is why I am the most powerful elemental in Fodlan!”

Her only reply came from a whistle of wind that rushed through the room. A light-hearted, laughable little lash of wind that whipped in through the window, stirred up Edelgard’s snow-white hair, and then scuttled away. “They infused opals into my bloodstream, and this… This is what I have become.” She ran her hands through her long hair, dead ends and all. “And now, I do believe I need a bath.”

She couldn’t even bring herself to look at Byleth. Despite all of her posturing and puffing, internally Edelgard was trembling like a leaf in a tempest. She slowly lowered herself into the water. Unsatisfied with its temperature, she set a low fire underneath her feet, causing the water directly around her to warm up from her heat.

“Edelgard…” Byleth began at last. Edelgard braced herself for whatever the Wind Princess would say. Would she denounce her as a false wind elemental? Would she hate her for keeping the secret of her abilities for so long? Would she--

Splashing. Spraying. Spluttering.

Byleth Eisner darted through the water until she was up directly in front of Edelgard and could grab the Fire Princess’s scarred hands in her own.

“You’re so beautiful.”

When was the last time Edelgard had heard those words?

Byleth squeezed Edelgard’s hands firmly, and then she lifted her eyes to look directly at the Imperial princess’s face. “In the Desert Lands, scars are a trophy.” She removed one of her hands and gently pressed the tip of her index finger against one of the scars on Edelgard’s collarbone. “A sign of struggle, but a sign of victory. A sign of a long, meaningful life.” She traced the scar down Edelgard’s sternum and around the curve of her breast, until her finger was resting directly over Edelgard’s heart. Could she feel her racing heartbeat through the water? “So this is what a heartbeat feels like,” she murmured. “Edelgard, you have the most glorious trophies I have ever seen. That is what makes you the most powerful elemental in Fodlan.”

Laid bare. Open. Vulnerable. Exposed.

Edelgard poured everything out to Byleth, whether or not the other woman would accept her, and in return she received the love she had so desperately sought all this time.

Unable to contain her elation, Edelgard dove forward in the bath until she was holding both of Byleth’s hands again. She interweaved her fingers with the Wind Princess’s, and she pressed forward until their chests met so that Byleth could feel Edelgard’s heartbeat as though it were her own. She thrust her face forward so fast that her nose slammed into Byleth’s, but she didn’t even care. She was more focused on the fact that their lips had smacked together. A sloppy, sweaty, salty kiss, streaked with Edelgard’s tears.

Wet but wonderful.

Much to her ever growing amazement and delight, Byleth reciprocated fully. She wrapped one hand around Edelgard’s waist and pulled her tighter into her embrace. Their movements were slippery, but their kiss was sweet and satisfying. 

Suddenly, a bright white light began to shine so brilliantly that Edelgard could even detect it through her closed eyelids. She carefully blinked her eyes open, her eyelashes fluttering as she tried to adjust to this sudden burst of light. Byleth had also opened her eyes, looking just as dazed and perplexed as Edelgard felt. 

“Your hair!” Byleth gasped.

“Your chest,” Edelgard breathed in response.

The two young women began to pull apart, but the soft glow lingered as it began to fade away. “Our opals,” Edelgard exclaimed in realization. “You… you do have an opal inside of you.” Linhardt had been on the nose with all of his theories and conjectures.

Well, except for the part where he proposed that their powers came from a meteor instead of dragons.

“Sothis said that our hearts were compatible,” Byleth recalled. She placed one hand over her heart, as through trying to hide the light, but it just shone through her pale skin as though her hand were translucent. As the light faded away and Byleth withdrew her hand, Edelgard became able to see a thick, jagged scar across Byleth’s chest, directly above where her heart should be.

“Sothis,” Edelgard whispered. “The first Guardian of Light.” The one who Lady Rhea was trying to revive.

A terrible thought struck Edelgard like lightning. “Sothis died long ago,” Edelgard began cautiously. “In order to revive her, Rhea would need to put her spirit in her body. There’s no way that body is still… usable.”

Byleth patted her chest. “But her heart is right here. She told me so.”

Edelgard swallowed hard, and she could feel her own spirit beginning to melt away into the bath. “Right. A part of Sothis still lives, inside of you. So… in order to revive her….”

“Rhea needs me.”

Byleth had come to the same conclusion she did.

“Rhea needs you as a vessel,” Edelgard agreed. “You don’t remember anyone putting a stone inside of you, right? What if… what if it happened when you were a baby?” Her eyes grew wide. The pieces of the puzzle were slowly coming together, taking shape. And they pointed directly at Rhea. “That’s why Jeralt fled. He wanted to save his child from whatever Rhea was planning.”

Byleth’s gaze flickered nervously between her scar and Edelgard. “We’re bringing me directly to her,” she pointed out. “We’re bringing my body, her vessel, directly to her.”

More than anything else, in this moment, Edelgard wished she were a water elemental. If she were, maybe she would be able to hold her tears back.

“If we want to truly stop Rhea from ever carrying out this plan, not just this July, but every July after…”

Byleth finished, and for the first time, Edelgard could detect sorrow in her usually emotionless voice. “We have to kill me to defeat Rhea.”


	13. Chapter 12: Squalls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The summer solstice has arrived.

"Is she going to be alright?"

Byleth couldn't help but overhear Dimitri's urgent whisper to his stepsister.

"She'll be fine once we're inside," Edelgard reassured him. However, judging from the way she awkwardly twirled some strands of her white hair back into her buns, she was more nervous than she was willing to reveal. "Worry about yourself, Dima. Your tendency to fret about others is admirable, but it's also one of your major weaknesses."

Byleth shifted her attention away from the squabbling siblings over to Constance, who had shrunk in on herself with shoulders hunched. She was chewing nervously on her thumbnail, looking as though she were regretting every life decision she had made in her life leading up to this point.

"Are we ready?" Edelgard called out at last. She turned to nod at each of her companions, as they all stood side by side. 

She first looked to her left, where Dimitri gently rubbed the sapphire embedded in the leather band around his wrist. She then looked far to her right, where Constance was fiddling with the emerald on her thin chain bracelet. Edelgard herself reached up to touch the ruby dangling from her necklace. And as she intertwined her fingers with Byleth, who stood beside her, Byleth smiled softly and put her hand over her heart, where her opal rested.

"For Fodlan!"

Together, their team marched forward.

* * *

Battered. Bruised. Bludgeoned.

Ever pressing onward, upward, and forward.

The royals finally arrived at the door to the Crystal Chamber, a whole slew of guards discarded behind them. "So this is the best that the Crystal Knights could offer," Edelgard murmured with a small smirk. "Pity. Perhaps your father was wise to abandon them."

Dimitri reached out to place a hand on her shoulder. "You talk tough, but you're limping, El. Be cautious."

Edelgard shrugged him off. "Byleth, go forth," she urged, ignoring her stepbrother’s warning. "She won't attack if it's just you."

Byleth nodded, and at once the other princesses and prince dispersed, pressing up against the stones on either side of the doorway. They would wait for her signal to strike. Until then…

What would happen to Byleth? How would Lady Rhea react?

She shook her head and stepped forward to curl her fingers around the silver handles of the thick mahogany double doors. Overthinking had never been Byleth's style.

With a deep breath, Byleth tugged on the handles and slid into the room beyond.

"So you've finally come for me."

The doors slammed shut behind Byleth, sending a small echo throughout the chamber. 

"An elemental hodgepodge. An experiment that should have gone awry." A tall woman in a long, glimmering gossamer gown stood facing the window, resting her chin on her right hand while her left hand's nails clacked along the stone windowsill. "A very naughty girl who should have come to her Guardian at once to tell her that she had been infused with Sothis' blood…." She rose to her full height, and the light reflected off of her seafoam green hair so that it sparkled like aventurine. "Isn't that right, Edelgard… von…" Her jade eyes widened in surprise when she took in the full figure of the young woman that had entered the room. "Mother?"

"Lady Rhea." Byleth bowed deeply at the waist in the deference she thought due, but once she remembered the secrets that Sothis had revealed, she straightened up. This woman, despite her position, had not earned Byleth's respect. "My name is Byleth Eisner. I am the daughter of Jeralt Eisner."

Rhea took a shaky step forward, her arms outstretched. "You're alive," she breathed. "As soon as I heard the rumors, I was hopeful, but I was so certain that Jeralt and his baby had died in the fire…." She shook her head, and her minty ringlets danced around her face. "It matters not. You have come back to me. To us." She spread her arms wide, and the chandeliers on the ceiling blazed with light.

Byleth gasped as she took in the details of the now-illuminated room. Four tall crystalline pillars stood in the center of the room, forming a square. Sparkling sapphire, radiant ruby, effervescent emerald, and opulent opal. In the center of these peaks, embedded into the stone floor, rested a placid pool.

"Come, come," Rhea encouraged her, and the train of her dress trailed behind her as she waltzed over to the pool. "Look up, darling Byleth," she encouraged.

Cautiously, Byleth took a couple of steps forward, inching closer and closer to the gems. They were beyond beautiful, and their colors were so rich and vivid that Byleth could hardly believe they were even crystals at all, and not just sculptures of solid stone. No, their colors must have been deepening as their power grew.

At the rest of the elementals' expense. 

"The Blue Sea Star will appear up here in a few days' time," Rhea whispered, and she raised her hands up towards a window in the ceiling that hung directly above the pool. 

_ "Blue Sea Star. _

_ Whether near or far. _

_ Your light will never fade. _

_ The kingdoms persist _

_ Per your final wish _

_ For peace for all our days." _

Her voice was clear as crystal, and her singing was soothing in her soft but strong voice. 

"Peace," Rhea repeated, and she brought her hands in towards her chest. "Oh Guardian of Light--no,  _ Queen _ of Light--will you not help me to vanquish these dragon-doubting, elemental-hating fools? Won't you help me restore the balance of the four kingdoms, with the Queen of Light ruling over all as she should?"

_ "Queen? Was I the Queen of Fodlan?"  _ Sothis' voice rumbled and grumbled inside Byleth's mind. She sounded just as befuddled as Byleth.  _ "I… no. My time has passed. Byleth, you  _ must  _ talk her out of this path!" _

"That  _ would  _ be convenient for you, wouldn't it,  _ Lady Rhea? _ "

A slam. A sneer. A sizzle. 

Byleth and Rhea both diverted their attention to the doors in the front of the room, where Edelgard von Hresvelg stood with her arms folded over her crimson-plated chest. "The dragons entrusted Fodlan to its people, not to you. Cease your scheming at once, you false prophet!" She thrust her arms out to her sides, sending out a warning flash of fire as she swept her arms wide. Dimitri and Constance each stood behind her on either side, both looking resolute in their goal.

Rhea's tender, loving, careful demeanor melted away at once, as a snarl curled her lip and caused her to bare her teeth at the ensemble before her. "Learn your place!" she hissed. "Your life is but a mere flicker of flame, while mine is like the sun!"

Hostility and bloodlust were rolling off of Rhea in waves; Byleth had enough experience with desperate dastards, threatening thieves, and rash rogues to be able to tell when a beast was preparing to strike. She jumped backward, in the direction of her friends. "Sorry, Lady Rhea," she murmured, "but I will not be your pawn."

Rhea swept her long hair back and wrapped one of the gold ropes on her wrist around it, pulling it into a ponytail. "Byleth, my darling," she murmured, once again regaining that gentle expression and soft smile. "I don't recall giving you a choice."

She lunged forward and planted a hand on the two crystals nearest to her: sapphire and emerald. The crystals glowed underneath her touch. Rhea removed her hand from the emerald and pointed her fingers directly at the quartet. She shot a flurry of thorns at them, emanating from each of her nails like arrows.

At once Edelgard retaliated with a flick of her own fingers, sending little fireballs to burn the thorns to a crisp.

Rhea tutted softly and stepped to the side, narrowly avoiding Edelgard's counterattack. She aimed her other hand at Edelgard, and a stream of steaming water erupted from her palm, sizzling and smoking as it flew through the air.

Constance jumped up beside Edelgard and stomped her heel into the ground. "I think not," she huffed, and a wall of woven vines, leaves, and brambles erupted from in between the cracks in the stone floor, shielding the party from the pulse of water.

Rhea tutted bitterly and wormed around the edge of the pool until she could plant one hand on the opal and one foot on the ruby. She swung her leg upward in a fearsome kick, and a jet of fire blazed forth from the sole of her boot. Even soaked in water as it was, Constance's shield of shrubbery would not be able to stand up to those flames.

Dimitri was already on top of the matter. He stepped to the side, out of the shield's protection, and thrust his arms downward from the ceiling all the way to the floor. A waterfall materialized before Constance's shield, effectively absorbing the impact of the flames and putting them out before they could pose a threat to anything or anyone that lay beyond.

"You can't keep acting on the defensive," Rhea sneered, and as she removed her palm from the opal, she balled her hand into a fist. She thrust her fist forward, and a gruesome gale hurtled at the plant wall so fast that it tore it to shreds. 

Byleth was at least able to counter with her own punch, sending a squall flying directly back at Rhea's. The two collided in midair, and the wind that blasted forth from the impact caused all five elementals to stumble, blown backward onto their rears by the sheer force.

Byleth and Edelgard were the first to rise, using the wind to propel themselves up to their feet. They each reached down to one of their companions to help pull them upright. "Sorry," Byleth mumbled as she helped Constance dust off her maroon-colored dress.

"Do not apologize," Constance reassured her. "You saved us with your quick wit and quick wind!"

Byleth blinked warmly at her, but their brief moment of respite soon came to an end. A gentle giggle had begun in Rhea's direction, and it soon culminated into a chuckle and finally a scornful, spiteful laugh.

"The Fire Princess, the Earth Princess, the Water Prince, and the Wind Princess," she murmured slowly, dragging each name out in her voice that dripped with venom. "I see that I am outmatched individually by the most potent elementals from all four kingdoms. 

It seems I will have to play that card after all."

Byleth crossed her hands in front of her face in an X, ready to send forth another barraging, breezy blow barreling for Rhea. The Guardian was too fast for her, however. She leaped to the side of the strike, and she gracefully stepped back over to the crystals, as though dancing on the wind itself.

Of course. Rhea was a natural-born wind user. She would be as agile and adept as Byleth, if not more so due to experience.

But Rhea was going to rely on a different ancestral power.

The Guardian of Light stepped into the pool in the center of the room, where she could stand in the center of all four crystal peaks. The quad began to glow as she took to the middle of them, and with a single raise of her hand, a burst of light erupted forth from each of them. Red, blue, green, and white all shot upwards at the ceiling, until they hit the edges of the glass pane embedded into the stone ceiling. They bounced off the edges as the glass pointed them all upward and inward, where they converged into a single beam of brilliant yellow light in the center of the window. 

Directly above the pool.

Directly above Rhea.

A rumble began to bubble inside the Guardian's chest. "Let me show you what the immaculate elemental looks like!" She roared as she threw back her head, and the light from the ceiling shot downward onto her. Her entire body began to glimmer and glow, illuminated by that mysterious merged light, a combination of all the elements.

Byleth had to shield her eyes from the dazzling light display before her, and judging from the whimpers and moans surrounding her, she wasn't the only one.

When the light faded and Byleth could finally adjust to the dimness of the crystal chamber once again, Rhea no longer stood in the center of the shallow pool.

Instead, a dragon rested in the middle of the four crystal pillars. The beast had huge, leathery wings; curled horns and talons; thick, wide scales; and a serpentine body.

_ "The Immaculate One." _

The purest combination of all four elements, and the dragon that Sothis had saved a millennium ago. That beast, with its body like silver snow, now lay before them.

Except unlike the dragon of old, this bellowing beast did  _ not  _ look happy to see the humans before her.

Even as the dragon bellowed before her and her teammates took position on either side of her, preparing to attack or defend as necessary, Byleth’s attention drifted elsewhere.

It drifted to a little whisper on the wind, a voice that had saved her countless times.

_ “The stones,”  _ Sothis breathed, and Byleth dared to let her eyes wander from the Immaculate One to the pillars.

She was glad she did.

A sharp crack had carved into the surface of each of the pillars. They all began to crumble and crack away exactly where Rhea had touched them mere moments before. Whatever spell Rhea had used to combine the elements and take on this form, it had absorbed a great portion of magical energy. After months--maybe even years--of abuse, that sudden transformation of elemental power may have been more than the stones could bear.

Their color faded as the cracks continued to creep along their surfaces. The crack on the sapphire trickled like water; the one on the emerald crawled like vines. The crumbling ruby pieces fell to ash, while the opal dust blew away in a cloud. All of the stones, which had been saturated with color and practically opaque when Byleth had first entered, were losing steam fast as sparkly, shimmery crystal dust fell forth from their surfaces. The color leaked out like blood from a wound, and the crystals began to grow pallid.

Apparently the apples did not fall far from the tree. The chaos that had consumed the crystal pillars had spread to the stones used to channel and manifest their power. Dimitri recoiled as a torrent of water sprayed forth from his wrist without his command. Constance shrieked as dirt began to spit from the emerald on her bracelet. Edelgard even seemed taken aback as a flamethrower erupted from her neck where her ruby hung.

As for Byleth, her chest began to glow a bright white, and the air in the room thinned out as wind began to whip and whistle around her feet, circling around her body. Byleth had become the eye of the storm.

This storm was not just one of wind, however. Water, earth, and fire soon joined the maelstrom that was spiraling around Byleth, all of them drawn to her.

_ “To me.” _

The stone in Byleth’s heart, the original stone of the Queen of Light, was ready to rise to the surface once again, and it was going to need all of the elements at its command in order to do so.

Rhea roared in outrage and tried to dig her claws into the ground to steady herself, but they scraped uselessly against the solid stone. She spat furiously and beat her wings, trying to maintain her posture and her form as she prepared to strike. Not even Rhea’s magic was listening to her, though; silver sparkles drifted from her scales and moved towards Byleth, who continued to serve as the sole channel for all of the elemental power in the room. As the sharp streaks and scars in the stones continued to spread, and their color and magic leaked out to join Byleth’s tornado, Byleth realized in a panic that she was about to become the sole channel for all of the elemental power in Fodlan.

The storm was becoming overwhelming. Byleth reached up and planted both hands on her chest, trying to come as close to her stone as physically possible. The other princesses and prince touched their stones when trying to reach the core of their powers; if she did the same, would she be able to command the winds once again? Byleth closed her eyes and tried to order the storm to fly away, to aim at Rhea, to fire at Rhea, to envelop Rhea.

The winds, instead of heading out, began to head inside of her. Water, fire, earth, and air all soaked into her breast, heading for her heart.

“Edelgard!” she cried out. Her eyes flew open once again, and much to her horror, the hair whipping about her face was no longer blue in color. Her hair was a minty shade akin to Rhea’s, and from what she could remember… akin to Sothis’.

As reds, blues, greens, whites, and silvers swirled around her and the power welling up inside of her grew in intensity, she began to lose sight of everything and everyone else in the room. “Edelgard, I need you!”

Edelgard was the only one she could entrust with this task. The only one with the drive, the determination, the dedication.

The fiery will that would burn through anything in her way, no matter the cost.

“My Teacher!” Edelgard shouted. She raced over towards Byleth, her fiery fists lighting her path as she pushed the assaulting elements out of her way. The magic was continuing to rush into Byleth, no matter what she tried to say or do to cease its onslaught.

Finally Edelgard was only about a foot away, but gusts and gales continued to wind around Byleth, preventing her from coming any further. “El,” Byleth croaked, hardly able to speak any more as her vision blurred and her head pounded. No human, elemental or not, could withstand this amount of elemental power. And if she didn’t hurry, she would not be human for much longer. “It’s as we feared. If all of the elements come together….”

“The dragons will destroy Fodlan,” Edelgard breathed. She looked up desperately at Byleth, her eyes swimming frantically with fear. An unusual emotion for the Fire Princess to bear. “What can I do? How can I help?” she demanded.

“Kill me!” Byleth cried out. “El, strike me down!”

Edelgard took a step forward, but the winds blasted her back. She stumbled and thrust her arms out as she tried to regain her balance; Edelgard von Hresvelg, however, did not fall. “No!” she roared. “I refuse! There must be another way!”

Byleth shook her head desperately. She tried to spot Edelgard beyond the wind, but now the corners of her vision were growing dark and cloudy. “Set me free!” she begged. “Set Fodlan free!”

Byleth could no longer see clearly, but she could easily imagine what Edelgard was doing right now. “Aymr,” Edelgard called out, her voice hollow. Byleth recalled the image of the blazing axe above Edelgard’s head in the main hall of the Imperial Palace. The ancient weapon she had used to command Byleth to stay and be her instructor.

How fitting that the same Aymr that changed her life should be the one to take her life.

“Now!”

Byleth braced herself for impact. She braced herself for blistering heat, for unbearable pain. She could remember the feeling and the smell of burning hair and flesh from her battle with Hubert, and the weeks of recovery and agonizing pain. Hopefully, Edelgard would take her out in a single strike and end the suffering as soon as it began.

A brief flash of fiery light, cutting through the wind. A brief flash of heat, searing her face.

A brief press of lips against lips, as Edelgard threw herself into the eye of the storm and sealed Byleth’s fate with a kiss.

“You’re not the only one with Sothis’ power inside of you,” she whispered, her breath hot and dry as it tickled Byleth’s minty hair and throbbing ears. “We will share this burden.”

Slowly but surely, Byleth could feel the throbbing in her head begin to fade. Light began to pour into her eyes once again, and she could see Edelgard’s white hair glowing like iridescent opals as she pressed her lips further and further into Byleth’s. Byleth allowed her eyelids to flutter closed and kiss her back--if they were to share this burden, they needed to give and take equally.

Finally, the two were able to pull apart, the balance of the elements carefully poised between them. Edelgard’s hair and Byleth’s chest were both aglow, but neither of them was going to collapse. Neither of them would give in. Not as long as they stood together, fingers interlocked, fates intertwined.

“Aymr,” Edelgard called again, and the fiery axe took position above her.

“Areadbhar!” Dimitri cried, and a lance of pure water and ice materialized above his head too.

“Vine whip!” Constance shouted, and a thick handle of wood materialized above her with a long, thorn-coated vine protruding from the bark.

Byleth pouted slightly. She had always felt more comfortable fighting as a mercenary than as an elemental, so why didn’t she get a weapon?

“Visualize it,” Edelgard whispered. “You’re more than capable of this, too.”

Byleth squeezed her eyes shut and tried to picture the perfect weapon for her: a sword. A sword with a sturdy, thick hilt that she could hold with two hands. A sword that was razor sharp, but was also flexible enough to bend with the wind if she willed it to do so.

“Sword…” Byleth began, and she raised her free hand to the sky. A thick cloud took the shape of a hilt, and she shut her eyes tightly again as she tried to picture the rest. A sword that could cut squalls into the air, a sword that could fight and defend.

“Sword of Sothis!” she decided, and the wind heeded her call to make a weapon of segmented blades. Pieces that would stand strongly together if she needed them to, but pieces that could also spread wide apart and allow the wind to whistle through.

The Immaculate One threw back her head and roared. “Give her back!” she screeched. “Give her back!”

Edelgard scowled and clenched Byleth’s hand tighter. “When humanity is strong and stands together,” she murmured in reply, “there is no need for guardians.”

With a mighty cry, Edelgard lunged forward with Aymr and swiped at Rhea’s throat. “This is for Fodlan!” she declared. The dragon leaped out of her way with ease. She reared back onto her hind legs, preparing to come tumbling down and crush Edelgard with her weight.

“Despicable!” Constance scoffed, and she flung her arm out towards Rhea, sending her whip lashing out to wrap around her hind legs. “Ohoho!” she laughed as the thick, thorny vines wound around the dragon’s ankles, and with a mighty tug, Constance pulled her down. “This is for the Earth Nation!” she shouted.

The dragon fell backward and Edelgard was able to safely roll out of harm’s way. Her front talons easily reached up to tear the vines from her back legs, but as she began to beat her leathery wings to help propel herself back onto her feet, a large shadow leaped forth and pierced one of her wings with a ferocious roar. Rhea bellowed in pain, but just above the dragon’s dismal, drowning voice, Byleth could hear Dimitri cry, “This is for Duscur!”

Rhea swiped with one of her free paws and batted Dimitri out of the way, sending him careening into the wall. She shook her head and tried to lick at her wing, nursing her wound.

Byleth did not want to give her any time to recover. “This,” she whispered as she gripped her sword with both hands. She flicked her jade green hair behind her head and dashed forward, shouting in rage, in frustration, in betrayal.

But above all, she rushed forward for Edelgard von Hresvelg, who had already lost so much and could not afford to lose anything, or anyone, else.

Byleth jumped and planted her boot on one of Rhea’s front legs. She raced up Rhea’s forearm, using the wing to carry her feet upward as though she were dancing in midair. She threw her leg around until she was seated on Rhea’s neck like a knight on her steed. “This is for El.”

A single stroke. A single stab. A single scream.

The Immaculate One collapsed, a sword of wind lodged firmly into her skull. As soon as the dragon’s writhing body hit the ground, though, Byleth slid off her neck, collapsing as well.

“Byleth!” Edelgard hardly had time to celebrate her victory. She thrust her palm outward to send a gentle wind to prevent Byleth’s body from slamming into the stone ground. The windy pillow was enough to slow Byleth’s descent, and Edelgard managed to dash over and catch her before she crashed. “Byleth?” she demanded. “Byleth!” The former mercenary’s chest was no longer glowing, and her body had grown rigid.

Dimitri and Constance rushed over at once, crouching beside the two young women who knelt pitifully beside the Immaculate One’s fallen body. “El,” Dimitri whispered. “Are you…”

Edelgard whipped her head around to glare at him, her eyes burning with fire. Burning with fire and brimming with tears. “The Edelgard who shed tears died a long time ago,” she muttered.

There was no point in maintaining her facade. Lightning flashed and thunder crashed outside, and it was as though the sky had joined Edelgard in her mourning. The Fire Princess wept, and as the rain poured forth from the clouds outside, so did the tears fall from Edelgard’s face and onto Byleth’s cold, ashen skin.

One drop. Two. A flurry of tears plummeted onto Byleth’s still chest.

A chest that had always been still.

A chest that suddenly, for the first time, began to pulse with life.

A gasp interrupted Edelgard’s sobs as Byleth’s breast began to glow once more. A soft, serene, snowy light that gently rose from her body until it took shape in midair.

“El, your hair,” Dimitri breathed. He raised a shaky finger to point at his stepsister’s white tresses, which were radiating with a similar light as Byleth’s heart. That light rose as well and floated over to the cloud of light above Byleth, and all three royals had to raise a hand to block their eyes from the blinding brilliance that blasted before them.

The cloud parted, and as the light faded, a single opal plopped onto Byleth’s chest. As soon as the stone hit her sternum, Byleth gasped, and her sky-colored eyes flew wide open. “E...del...gard?” she murmured. The minty hue of her hair began to wither away, leaving behind a familiar midnight blue. “I…” She reached up feebly to cup her fingers around Edelgard’s cheek. With a soft little smirk, she whispered, “I like you better as a brunette.”

Edelgard ignored her companions’ insulted gasps as she leaned forward to plant a kiss on Byleth’s forehead.


	14. Chapter 13: Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Princess Edelgard's wedding has come at last.

_ “Did you hear? Did you hear the news?” _

_ “Who is the suitor that the Princess did choose?” _

_ “Did she decide on the nobleman Lorenz?” _

_ “No, I heard she opted for one of her friends!” _

_ “Then surely she is to marry Ferdinand.” _

_ “Well, I heard she is not to marry a man!” _

Murmurs, mutters, and mumbles drifted all around the Fire Empire in the weeks leading up to the wedding. The matter of the Fire Princess’s betrothal had long been an interest of the Empire’s residents, after all; whoever married the princess would help her rule the most powerful political body in Fodlan.

The only information that managed to leak out to the general populace was that the princess had chosen a suitor, but no other details managed to escape the Fire Princess’s grasp. All summer long, rumors floated about like whispers on the wind, like leaves in the breeze, like babbles in a brook, like heat from a hearth. 

Edelgard had no desire to extinguish their excitement. She would allow the gossip to spread like wildfire, if it would satisfy the people. After all, she had no time to concern herself with the meddling affairs of the common folk.

She only had three months to plan her wedding, after all.

Finally, September rolled around. The summer heat was giving way to autumn chills, as breezes blew through the leaves that changed color from luscious lime to lemon, orange, cherry, and fig. These colorful leaves, the colors of flames, had not yet fallen from the trees, but as the autumn equinox grew ever closer, the people waited for them to descend like falling ashes.

But the residents of the Fire Empire--no, all of Fodlan--had a more important matter to occupy their attention on the day of the autumn equinox.

* * *

Bells. Chimes. Sopranos. Altos. Music of all tunes, shapes, and sizes joined together in harmony to welcome the bride as she entered the throne room.

She would find herself here soon again for her coronation, but if she was to be crowned Emperor, then she wanted to have the love of her life by her side to be crowned, too.

As soon as the Imperial Guards closed the double doors behind Edelgard, everybody in the room rose to their feet. Rows and rows of benches filled with nobles, from dukes and duchesses to earls and ladies. They all rose at once before the brilliant, bright blaze of the Fire Princess, who shone with such radiance that even her veil could not cover her light.

One foot in front of the other. A soft heel clacked against the stone floor before the princess stepped onto velvet carpet stretched out before her. The red velvet raced down the center of the room all the way to the base of the staircase before the Emperor’s throne. The princess, usually so bold, couldn’t help but find her gaze fixed down at her feet. Part of her trepidation was definitely due to her anxiety about walking in such delicate heels or tripping over the hefty, billowing skirts of her white dress, but the other reason was that she feared she would faint if she looked up to see the figure awaiting her at the top of the staircase.

Plus, it would be a shame if she crushed any of the petals of the crimson flowers that lined her red carpet.

Edelgard glided forward like a star, draped from head to toe in pure white. Her silk bodice gave way to a satin skirt covered in a layer of tulle, and her lace sleeves were so thick and patterned that they even managed to conceal her scars. Scars that she had only revealed to one.

She tugged a little self-consciously at the edges of her silk gloves, ensuring that they covered her marred hands. After all, as soon as she ascended those steps, her hands would be the center of attention of everyone in the room.

Finally she was almost at the base of the stairs. Her gaze flickered to her left, where Hubert gave her a brisk nod. Her eyes flashed to her right, where Dimitri gave her a warm smile.

For the first time that day, Edelgard dared to raise her head and look up at her love.

In a beautiful, blinding light that rivalled Edelgard’s own, Byleth Eisner stood in a white tuxedo, her blue bangs pinned back and her messy locks pulled into a ponytail. How odd for Byleth to be the one with her hair pulled back while Edelgard allowed hers to float freely behind her, with only the front pieces pulled back by a pair of simple white ribbons.

She missed having her chestnut hair, and the luscious light brown locks that tumbled down her back bounced and floated as Edelgard ascended the steps that led to the throne.

A vow to protect Byleth for all her life? In sickness and in health? Until death parted them?

Edelgard had lived through Byleth’s death once already, and she would do it again in a heartbeat. “I do,” she murmured, her voice as light as a feather.

“I do,” Byleth affirmed, and she sounded as though she were on cloud nine, too.

A young woman with long, radiant dark brown curls ascended the steps behind them, carrying a soft velvet pillow that shone as red as the carpet and bore golden tassels brighter than the sunlight pouring in through the windows. She winked at Edelgard as she held out the pillow, upon which two rings rested.

A ring of ruby and a ring of opal.

Edelgard reached up to tap her chain necklace, now barren of the red gem that used to hang from her neck. She was Edelgard von Hresvelg, and she did not live with regrets: she knew the decision that she and Byleth had reached was the best one.

“With this ring, I do thee wed,” Edelgard murmured, and she picked up the ruby ring. As she pressed the small stone in between her fingers, she felt a familiar rush of heat race through her body. “Byleth von Hresvelg.” Byleth extended her left hand, and Edelgard slid the ruby ring onto her finger.

“With this ring, I do wed thee-- thee wed?” Byleth corrected herself. Edelgard chuckled softly and nodded. “With this ring, I do thee wed,” Byleth repeated, after getting confirmation from Edelgard that she was carrying forth the process properly. Edelgard held out her left hand, and Byleth placed the opal ring over the silk glove and gently pushed it down so that it rested at the base of Edelgard’s finger. “With this ring, I give you my heart,” Byleth whispered, so quietly that only Edelgard could hear her.

The Wind Princess’s ruby ring. The Fire Princess’s opal ring. They were truly entrusting their lives, both in matrimony and in their elemental capacity, to one another. They would need to be together in order to properly harness their powers.

And they would not have the situation any other way.

“We fight together, or not at all,” Edelgard replied, and the curt nod that Byleth gave her said more than any words could. She was blunt, she was brash, she was simple. 

She was the wind beneath the wings of the future Flame Emperor.

Edelgard might have been told she could kiss her bride. She might not.

As the Fire Princess, she did not exactly need to wait for permission.

Edelgard jumped to Byleth and wrapped her arms around her neck, nearly whacking her with her bouquet. Byleth, in turn, planted her hands on Edelgard’s waist and hoisted her up into the air. They kissed deeply, passionately, fierce like fire but smooth like water, breezy like the wind but solid like the earth.

The crowd roared with applause and cheers. No longer wanting any obstruction between herself and her princess, Edelgard chucked her bouquet into the audience, and then she eagerly squeezed Byleth’s cheeks between her hands. “I love you, Byleth,” she whispered.

“I love you, El.”

Hubert was so enraptured in the scene before him, captivated by the radiant smile of his dear princess, that he didn’t even notice when a barrage of flowers smacked him in the head. He reached up and caught the bulk in his hands, brushing leaves and petals out of his black hair with an air of annoyance. “What am I supposed to do with this…?” he muttered.

A painfully familiar face popped up behind him. “Perhaps I could tell you over a cup of tea?” Ferdinand von Aegir grinned at him and extended his hand, offering to take the bouquet.

Hubert gladly obliged and dropped the cluster of flowers into his palm. “I would prefer coffee,” was all he said in reply, but his pale face easily revealed the blush on his face that matched the ruby in his collar.

_ “For peace for all our days.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you SO much for reading! This was my first multichapter fic, and I enjoyed the experience so much! I want to thank the Black Eagle Zine Force and the Edeleth BB 2020. I also want to thank Phatom12 for the amazing art! I also want to give an extra shoutout to my friends who encouraged me, my fellow writers who motivated me, and edeleth for existing. <3


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